


Forging a Destiny

by phyreblade



Series: Destiny [1]
Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Legends - All Media Types, Star Wars Legends: The Old Republic
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-08-08
Updated: 2015-12-23
Packaged: 2018-04-13 16:02:19
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 116
Words: 197,509
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4528338
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/phyreblade/pseuds/phyreblade
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Lord Lusiel, Sith Warrior, strives to prove herself, to create a legacy, to cast her name down in the annals. Follows the story line created by Bioware for the Sith Warrior class, and never strays too far from the original tale. F/SW with Quinn love interest. Other characters will be considered as story progresses. All characters are property of Bioware and EA, even if I wished otherwise.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. On Balmorra

                                                       

Vette followed along behind her Sith – and when did she start thinking of the Sith as hers, anyway – emerging from the confines of the spaceport into the muggy heat of the battle-torn planet called Balmorra. She sniffed delicately, eyeing the towering artillery guns with horrible trepidation and mumbling morosely, "I hope they don't have to shoot those things while we're here." Lusiel glanced at her, offering a small twisted smile before turning once again to continue striding forward.

Vette sighed, utterly certain she would never understand the Sith. She'd seen Lusiel perform disgusting acts; even been on the receiving end of them, frowning briefly as she rubbed her neck where the shocks from the collar still stung her memory. Yet the Sith continued to confound her, providing brief glimpses of decency and honor, too. Just enough that Vette was utterly confounded what Lusiel was really all about. Vette had thought several times Lusiel acted as she did only to confuse her poor Twi-lek sensibilities, to keep her on her toes. Maybe she was determined to keep everyone wondering, Vette thought.

Lusiel didn't stop long enough to soothe Vette's confusion, either. Within the hour of arriving at Balmorra, she had a turncoat tortured by Imperials and then framed rebels for the killing of a Chiss delegate, only to turn and ask Vette, with pure and unfettered pleasure, "How about a drink, since we're already in the cantina? What would you like, Vette?" The twi'lek grinned at the utter incongruity, before cheerfully ordering her favorite beverage, knowing the Sith could afford the expensive liquor and glancing around with interest at the busy cantina. Beside her, Lusiel sipped a fruity concoction, sighing with some degree of happiness.

"I just don't get you at all," Vette said, finally. Vette never was one to keep her commentary to herself, at least. Which is how she justified it, mind you. The Sith did remove the shock collar from her neck, at least. So she should be prepared for whatever inanity sprouted from Vette’s freed mouth, right?

"What do you mean?" Lusiel was genuinely confused by the remark. She always thought herself to be very honest in her dealings, even blunt. Yet here was Vette, making a remark she'd heard countless times, enough she was prepared to stomp a foot in disgust. What was there to “get” that she wasn't demonstrating in every action she took?

"Well, you have to admit you're hard to really understand sometimes."

"I am not! Why does everyone say such things? I'm easily the simplest person in the world to understand!"

"Are we talking about the same Sith, here? Lord Lusiel, apprentice to Darth Baras? The same Lord Lusiel who can swipe her saber against some poor sod and then turn right around and pat a sad guard who cries over the body of a dead apprentice? That Lord Lusiel?"

Lusiel frowned thoughtfully. "You mean Vemrin? He was not worthy of the name Sith. He failed. Failure can't be tolerated. If the failed are allowed to succeed, it weakens the Empire as a whole. But that doesn't mean we shouldn't sorrow or mourn them when they’re destroyed. I endured many such encounters during my years on Korriban, as I did when Vemrin attacked." She shrugged, “I proved I was stronger, that’s all.”

Vette sat back against the wall, slightly stunned. It occurred to her Lusiel took great strides in every choice she made to make the absolute right choice. By whatever measure she used to gauge right and wrong, of course. Vette was pretty certain Lusiel's concept of right and proper behavior was a far cry from her own, anyway. But she wasn't like so many Sith Vette had considered over the past several months, those who insanely delighted in using their power against others without regard for the consequence. This wasn’t about pleasure or even satisfaction. No, Lusiel was determined, she was focused, rather. She knew exactly what she was doing and where she was headed, even if she didn't share such knowledge with her twi'lek companion.

Vette thought of the first words Lusiel had ever said to her, the cold and dispassionate tone she used as she pressed the button that activated the shock collar around Vette's neck. She had thought her a typical Sith in that moment. But it occurred to her the smelly jailor had thought the same thing, certainly. When Lusiel later removed the collar, she reminded Vette of that place, told her that the role of slave was one that provided her some protection and safety in the Empire and that Lusiel holding the controls to the collar kept such men as the jailer from misusing her. Lusiel told her, “Be careful, Vette. The next one holding this controller won’t be so understanding.” Vette wondered how often Lusiel acted to provide that blanket of security, portrayed herself a typical Sith only to keep those around them in their own typical place. There was some security in the "typical", after all.

"Yea, I think I do get it. I mean …What would that Imperial officer have thought if you just trusted the turncoat," Vette wondered aloud.

"She would have thought me weak, a Sith to be manipulated or used. She may have made mention of my supposed weakness to other Sith, so that word reached the ears of my Master. Weakness, even if only in appearance, can be acted upon. It is essential no one ever believe me weak, else I spend the whole of my life fighting to prove otherwise. Even I can't fight everyone."

"Wow. Haven't you ever wanted to just be normal?"

"Vette, that will never happen. So, no, I've never wanted it. Why desire something impossible?"

"So what do you want?"

Lusiel chuckled. "Right now, I want to finish this delightful drink, before getting back to the task at hand. I can't imagine there's anything on this sorry rock of a world I could ever really want, anyway."

Vette laughed along with her, as they gathered up their things and headed back into the madness of a Sith's life. She was still thinking of the conversation as they entered the military compound in search of Baras' contact on Balmorra, the Imperial officer he called Quinn. And she thought how incredibly ironic it was as she watched Lusiel's face during that first meeting between them. She would joke later, how funny it was -- as if some old Gods had laughed themselves silly at Lusiel's expense after she'd made such remarks. Because Vette would always say, it was obvious from the start Lusiel wanted Quinn more than she ever desired some fruit cocktail.


	2. First Glances

Years afterward, Malavai Quinn would describe to his small and curious daughter the first moment he laid eyes on her mother.  He would watch his little girl’s dark eyes, so similar to Lusiel's, widen and glisten with wonderment. He would tell her of Lusiel's beautiful features -- the chocolate depths inherent in her eyes, the way her ebony-colored hair was gathered up and tied in a silky, gorgeous mass, and how her skin, pale and smooth only invited soft touches and easy hugs. He would speak of the richness of her voice, the strength so inherent in her character that showed in every word she shared. But, mostly, he would tell his child how it was he knew as soon as he saw her, that his life would never be the same again.

He certainly did not describe to his daughter how his body grew hard and tight when Lusiel first strode into the room. _It’s not desire_ , he told himself during the moments that followed, and never mind how exquisite he thought the Sith really was. No, of course not. Because there simply was no reason to even consider such a chance and possibility. He wasn’t worthy, firstly.  She was Sith -- to be respected and admired, but never _had_ , never possessed and called one’s own. And she was so damn young, to boot.  Quinn mentally shook himself.

Lusiel wasn’t paying Quinn overt attention right then.  She was actually watching his inept subordinate scamper from the room like a tired little rodent terrified it was soon to be eaten. Which, truth told, Quinn was tempted to do to the man. Well, not serve him up like a roast over the tabletop at dinnertime. But ruin or destroy him, at the least. The fool’s sorry actions had earned the deaths to an entire patrol as they passed through a sector that should have been secure. But this time, his idiot underling failed to consider recent reports.  He relied on outdated information, and those Soldiers in that patrol paid the price for the blunder.  Quinn rather believed the soldiers even dead were far more worthy of the word Imperial than the incompetent fool rushing to leave the room, in fact. He even snorted as he watched the blasted man’s scampering backside, thinking he rather resembled some kind of slinking rat with its tail tucked between its legs.

Then Lusiel turned to regard Quinn himself, a brief light sparking her dark eyes. Quinn gathered himself once again, bowing to her as he wondered over the best way to handle this young Sith lordling. He watched her lips curl up into a polite smile as he introduced himself. For the briefest moment, Quinn recalled the description Darth Baras initially provided of his apprentice. "She's dark, quite willful, definitely strong but, still.  She’s young and impetuous, prone to bluntness – Oh, I doubt you'll like her much, Quinn. Just a wild little thing, not something I think you would appreciate." Looking at her now, finally, Quinn thought that dark was certainly a good word to describe her. Her eyes were pools of warm darkness, the sort that tempted.  Like sweet chocolate. But there was more, there, too. He felt like he gazed into a swirling mass of dark water as he looked into her eyes.  And she was shaped like something small and tempting, too, all feminine curves in a tight little package he wanted to … Quinn shook himself. _Focus, Malavai_ , he thought firmly.

"Lieutenant Malavai Quinn, my lord. I am to act as your liaison here on Balmorra," Quinn spoke quickly, trying to gather his straying thoughts towards the task at hand. The niggling worry over how to handle a Sith described by her own master as "a wild little thing" and "impetuous" he planted firmly in mind.

"I am pleased to make your acquaintance, Quinn," she nodded at him in return, her tone warm and inviting. Silky and friendly.  Why did he keep thinking of chocolate and candy around her? 

Quinn caught the sudden startled glance that Twi-lek following the Sith shot her right then, before she twisted her gaze back towards one of the far walls of the headquarters again.  Interesting, he thought. Somehow the Sith had acted out of character. He wondered what Lusiel had done or said that was … strange. She certainly did not seem prone to temperamental fits, at least. She even remained attentive as he described the strategic situation on the planet, declaring firmly how important it was the Republic's interests on the world be ruined, an attitude he greatly approved. She impressed him, actually. Quinn reminded himself, that Baras had doubts in regards his apprentice.  He would calculate her potential to succeed at the task Baras described, accordingly. Still, he _wanted_ Lusiel to impress him, and the desire to watch her succeed surprised him. Desire … another word that persisted around her. 

Quinn watched Lusiel as she withdrew, intent on carrying Quinn's bomb to its intended target.  The Twi'lek girl followed behind her, providing some pithy remarks about the climate of the planet of all things. Who talked to a Sith about the weather, after all? And why didn't Lusiel respond with some sharp retort or painful twist of the idiot girl's lekku?

Indeed, Lord Lusiel did not behave as he thought a Sith would.  Which actually added to her allure. No, Quinn thought. Lord Lusiel was hardly a typical Sith.


	3. You Liked Him

"You do realize, right?  That Imperial back there was just – oh, what's the word? – blown away, perhaps. Why didn't you treat him like you do most Imperials?" Vette clambered over the rocks and depressions made by years of combat, paying close attention to Lusiel's motions around the ravaged terrain. The Sith, at least, had an advantage in finding the safest course through the havoc. _That Sithy Force thing of hers_ , she thought.  She would save herself a twisted ankle at the very least, so long as she followed in Lusiel’s methodical path over the field.

Lusiel glanced back at her, briefly. As usual Lusiel appeared bewildered over Vette’s meandering thought process.  "What do you mean? I'm polite to most Imperials."

"Polite? Is that what that was? I mean, heck, yea, I've seen you _polite_ plenty of times. But back there? Geez, you were actually _nice_ to the guy!  For a second, I thought you would shake his hand, even.  Salute him, maybe."

Lusiel stopped and turned turned to look at Vette, and the confusion on her face was actually funny enough Vette grinned wickedly at her. She even guessed what would come out of the Sith's mouth next. _Hey, Vette_ , she told herself, _you just might be getting the hang of this Sith, after all_.

"Explain what you mean. I would think that being polite is indeed very nice. Isn't it?  How then is anything I did during that particular meeting even unusual?"

Vette actually laughed. Out loud. Lusiel’s features became even more confused-looking, which sent Vette into further gales of whooping laughter. She actually bent over sideways, so that her lekku flopped over her shoulders nearly to the ground.  It wasn't until the Sith frowned at her, firmly, that Vette finally choked back her guffaws to splutter an understandable response.

"Oh.  Forgive me, my lord. Yes, being polite is very nice. But I could tell being polite to that particular Imperial really pleased you, that you wanted to make him happy. Heck, you liked him! That's what it was! I couldn't figure it out before but that's honestly what it was! You _like_ Quinn!"

Lusiel pursed her lips, considering it like it was a puzzle worth putting pieces together across a flat tabled surface.  Then she shrugged, almost nonchalant, "He impressed me." Lusiel shot Vette a wicked look of her own and she hummed, sounding purely female.  And hungry. "Perhaps it was his eyes. Blue eyes like that are truly _nice_ ," Lusiel drawled. Actually drawled.

Vette broke down, laughing once again. "Only you would find a stiff board of a man like that worth looking at," Vette chuckled.

"Just look at? Ah, Vette. Let's not limit our considerations, here."

"Ah, no, my lord! Not me, and thank you very much to keep me completely out of this particular chance. I leave it to you to think about _touching_ Mr. stick-up-his-backside. Ewww."

Lusiel chuckled at Vette's sneering shudders before returning to her course. Up ahead, Lusiel could just make out the compound the pair was looking for, with its spires and antennae reaching into the smoke-filled air overhead.  She frowned at the number of droids and guards gathered around the entrance. Such security was unusual, almost marking the place a tempting target.

Lusiel shook her head against such an obvious miscalculation. When trying to hide something, you didn't announce its importance to the entirety of your enemies, after all. What was worse, none of the security the Republic fools had put in place was even vaguely adequate. Only some small minutes, made up of the spattering shouts from dying guards and the flying sparks from a few dozen droids, and Lusiel was standing in front of the doors of the compound, seemingly cool and unhurried.  She didn’t even watch as Vette manipulated the door's computer.  She only held her lightsaber against her thigh with can utterly calm, composed hand, listened to its song in her mind and awareness as she only waited for the doors to open and the real fight to commence.  


	4. Watching Her

"You will continue monitoring our surveillance of the Republic control tower as my apprentice's attack begins, Quinn. Make sure I am kept apprised of her progress. I will need to address her once she has placed the explosive," Darth Baras' holographic image twinkled over Quinn's computer console.  He lowered his chin deferentially.

"Of course, my lord. I am already monitoring the station, watching for your apprentice," Quinn assured the Sith lord. He paused, frowning as he watched the interior of the Republic facility using the security cameras the Empire had sliced into, for access.  It allowed him eyes and ears inside the compound, and now he counted the large number of milling troops and droids in the rooms and around the console that Lusiel was supposed to reach.

"You appear concerned, Quinn. There is no need," Baras asserted, sounding amused.

Quinn was uncertain. So much of what Baras was hoping to accomplish was hidden from his own consideration, after all.  Which was hardly unusual.  Sith objectives were typically hard to discern.  Quinn certainly did not presume he understood what Darth Baras was truly focused on accomplishing here on Balmorra, even if his own understanding might help him accomplish the task Baras asked of him.  No, when Baras insisted on privacy to address his apprentice, Quinn withdrew.  Whatever Baras wanted done, his intentions were beyond Quinn’s purpose.  And he had no qualms over the issue, even.  It was simply how things were done across the Empire.

"I only wish to properly calculate your apprentice's chance at success, my lord.  To mitigate any challenge as it arises," Quinn responded, assuredly.

"My apprentice has prevailed in situations I thought would be unduly difficult, however.  _I_ have no doubt she will easily overcome this current challenge," Baras admitted.  Quinn rather felt Darth Baras frowning, more than he discerned it from behind the mask Baras was always wearing.  It occurred to Quinn, that Baras was uneasy of his own apprentice.  That might prove dangerous for the younger Sith, he supposed.  And that’s when Quinn realized he thought of Lusiel like she was already an equal of Baras, than truly subordinate to him.  As if leadership was innate to her.

And Darth Baras _was_ frowning, too.  Lusiel's growing strength and abilities remained one of his primary concerns, Baras thought. Only the most foolhardy of Sith underestimated their apprentices.  Every Sith was doomed to fight for his every seat, his every position of power – to keep it for his own, even as the apprentice sought to take it.  And Baras had watched Lusiel, had seen her approach into his office grasping the prized Ravager she ripped from the blackest reaches of the Dark Temple.  It sent a thrill through him even now, thinking of how she looked right then, after he had assumed her incapable of surviving and then to watch her emerge victorious. It was not the first time she had surprised him. But it was at that moment, looking at her standing there unconcernedly -- as if the sheer malevolence that prevailed in the Temple was just so insignificant to her -- that Baras was suddenly sure _this_ was the apprentice who might doom him. Her strength and power was already tremendous, and she was still so young!  Only barely shy of twenty years!  No, give her time enough and she would prove unstoppable.

For now though, Lusiel was absolutely necessary. Nomen Karr needed to be destroyed, the threat he posed was far greater right now than that of a young, growing apprentice. Baras only knew it would not be long before he needed to destroy Lusiel, as well.  Hopefully before she noted his true intentions, even.

"My lord, your apprentice has arrived at the facility. She is breaching the doors now. She is ..." Quinn's voice tapered off as he watched the scene unfold, his eyes going wider and wider as he considered the scene.

The doors opened and Lusiel moved forward, swinging her lightsaber in what seemed near gentle arcs.  Such gorgeous, elegant motions, until the screams and shouts assured her the enemy she battled was down and she moved on to the next. She almost appeared to be dancing, her battle rhythm was so sinuous, so fluid a thing. She never paused, never showed concern or doubt -- she just pressed forward, always forward, while all around her Republic soldiers and droids collapsed in sodden heaps of blood and wires. Behind her came Vette, providing a constant barrage of covering fire and keeping enemies pinned long enough for the Sith to approach and destroy them.

It was a smooth and awe-inspiring display of synchronization between the two. But it was the Sith's own controlled motions that truly impressed. Quinn felt himself hardening again as he watched her, watched her legs firmly planted through her swings and her torso twisting in precise and controlled movements, thrusting her breasts upwards into hard, perfect mounds every time she raised her lightsaber. She was an extraordinary example of Imperial might and glory, a sight to behold, beauty in sheer power.

"Now that there, boyo, is a Sith," one of the Imperials behind Quinn breathed out to the assembled team, awed. The remark brought Quinn back to a semblance of reality. He had a job to do, and he looked back towards his men.  He frowned as he saw they were all watching the screens like slavish devotees, rather than the Imperial support the Sith were relying upon.

"Be ready! They'll reach the control room very quickly at this rate," Quinn barked out the order, watching his men only long enough to assure they were focused on the task at hand once again. But then he could not help but return to his consideration of the Sith's progress.  He tapped his fingers over the terminal, making his notes and marking every step of progress Lusiel made as she moved from room to room, heading unerringly towards her objective.  He was totally fascinated.

Baras chuckled darkly. "She is succeeding, I take it."

"Yes, my lord," Quinn responded, almost as an aside.  He didn’t even look up from the monitors as he nodded. Baras was vaguely surprised how intensely Quinn considered the course.  Such interest was completely unusual where the Imperial was concerned.  Curious, Baras widened his perception, reaching out with the force to best divine what compelled the officer in that moment.  It was a skill Baras had brought to almost perfection over the years, far beyond that of most Sith. He utilized the ability to discern the best means by which to manipulate his precious tools throughout the varied landscapes of power, whether in the Empire or the Republic. Baras was certain his abilities in this regard were without match. No one and nothing would threaten all he'd managed to accomplish.

Although Lusiel had guessed quickly where Baras' skill was strongest.  An amazing feat in such a young, inexperienced Sith, actually. One that very much impressed him as much as anything else Lusiel accomplished.  Most often, Baras was already able to methodically and systematically compel his subjects, had measured their weaknesses enough to direct them, and long before they were aware of his own Force-strong ability.  But Lusiel countered Baras time and again, only remaining unfailingly obvious in her disdain and disgust of him. Initially, her temerity amused. But he realized quickly the real weapon her open emotions proved to be, as she actually used her blunt refrain and even outright insults against him to hinder him exploiting her. When it was difficult for him to discern what was true and what was a lie of hers, when her secrets were squirreled and obscured by her real disgust and upset, it became possible for her to neatly skirt Baras from blocking her into any one particular place.  He often wondered where she’d learned such a remarkable feat of skillful maneuvering, actually.  Or maybe it was some hallmark of her incredibly admirable will, rather.  Whatever made it, though, it was exceedingly dangerous to him.

But Quinn had absolutely no defense against Baras' Force abilities.  Most especially not after Baras had regularly explored his will using the technique many times over the years.  So Baras easily discerned the emotional state in which the Lieutenant was struggling just then, the sheer tumult of fascinated attraction and simmering desires that occupied him. Baras was amused, if only because Quinn was typically aloof and even taciturn when it came to romantic entanglements. Not that he was adverse to female companionship.  But Quinn hadn’t formed any sort of lasting commitment to a woman that Baras knew of, tending to regard women with a sort of bored detachment. As if they were brief diversions from the real passion with which he approached his work, and regardless of how intensely attractive women themselves found him. Yet here Quinn wrestled with what Baras sensed was a budding absorption in one particular female. Interesting, he thought. Very interesting, indeed.

"My lord, your apprentice has reached the control room and is placing the explosive now," Quinn suddenly asserted.


	5. Like a Singing Bird in a Cage

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Darth Baras directs the Sith Warrior to veer from the mission just long enough to destroy the son of traitor there on Balmorra. The traitor foolishly exposed the truth of his work for Baras to his own son, and now the Republic has arrested the son and is seeking answers from him. The Sith Warrior must decided how to proceed.

Lusiel approached the boy locked in his silly little cage. There was a Republic officer facing the cage already, his back to her as she entered the room.  The boy’s eyes widened as he caught sight of her and he started stuttering, then.  The officer leaned closer to the cage, asking the boy to repeat his assertions about his father’s work for the Empire.  To say again, how his father was a real servant of Darth Baras’ and an outright traitor in Republic uniform. 

Zixx was the officer’s name, and cybernetic implants gleamed along the curve of his jaw. Who called a cyborg Zixx? It sounded like something you stenciled on the side of machine, anyway, and she suddenly pictured a box being offloaded from a transport, big letters reading ZIXX written on the side. She very nearly laughed. Nearly.  Instead, she provided the cyborg support in his oh-so-masterful query. _Never let anyone call her less than helpful_ , she thought merrily.

"Yes, please, repeat that, Junior. We're all ears."

Of course, the cyborg was less than pleased with her assistance.  Zixx spun around to face her, his eyes wide and startled.  He even barked out demands, “Who … How did you get in here?”  Foolish machine-man. Wasn't he interested in what the silly boy had said? She felt her mouth twitch. Lusiel opted to play one of her oldest, dearest, and favorite games. One that carried her through many challenges and terrible encounters at Korriban, when her fellows made it such a point to prove how powerful they were and only floundered up against Lusiel’s tenacity and strength.  She took to playing mental games, to hide from the terrible travail anger and disgust could make to her mind and her nature.  And the game was simple enough.  To win, she managed to get through this entirely amusing episode without laughing.

 _Oh, let the fun ensue_ , she mentally grinned.

The boy very nearly lost her the game right away, though.  He was shaking, there in his cage.  She rather thought he might lose control of his bladder as he sputtered, "It's not a … a … who! It's a what ... a … SITH!" Zixx shot the young man a hard look of disgust from over his shoulder and Lusiel bit the inside of her lip in desperation.

"He may need you to retrieve him a new pair of pants, I think," Lusiel pointed at the boy.

The cyborg disappointed her with yet another inane response. Didn't the fellow have any sense of humor at all? "Who cares whether Durmat pisses himself. All I needed was time to get what _I_ needed, actually," Zixx gestured towards the doors where several soldiers were just then hurrying inside.  Lusiel turned sideways to better gauge the new arrivals, while still keeping Zixx in her line of sight, too.

Poor Vette was groaning and Lusiel literally rolled her eyes at her. Fighting soldiers every step of the way along this little adventure her delightful master tasked her with was par for the course, and Vette should understand that much at least.  Or maybe Vette was still bothered by this particular scenario, that Baras insisted they destroy a mere youngster of a boy barely out from his teens.  The son of Lusiel’s ultimate target here on Balmorra, in fact.  And never mind he was dressed in a Republic uniform of his own, either.  He was as much a boy as Lusiel’s own brother.  Likely they were the same age, even.

But Durmat was shaking, trembling like some bush caught in a storm outside.  He clutched the bars of the cage around him with tight fingers, his wide eyes flaring with fear and distress.  Her brother would never appear so shamefully frightened and pitiable.  Lusiel remembered a Jedi caught in a cage there on Korriban, suddenly, trapped and confused as he stared out at her.  Like Durmat was, just young and pitiful and left to fail. If only she could destroy the ones who sent them into such untenable dangers, rather.

Instead Lusiel faced down the more familiar, the more predictable challenge posed by the Republic squad.  Oh, and Zixx.  Let’s not forget the cyborg, Lusiel thought as she sneered at him, remarking, "Do you expect me to be afraid of some mere soldiers?  You really can’t imagine how it is I got inside here?  Truly?" Zixx frowned at her so slowly. Maybe the joke only went over his head.

Lusiel just shrugged, though, readying her saber before leaping into the fray. She could hear Vette behind her, blasters popping off wildly.  But her lightsaber sang its song all around and through her. Lusiel let the rhythm of the battle fill her, to move as she sensed it needed to go.  And she responded rapidly to the fluctuating motions of her opponents, steady, easy motions flowing, to make all the soldiers fall seamlessly to the floor at her feet.  Like dolls who’s strings were cut so suddenly.  Until only Zixx was left and he actually squealed as Lusiel turned towards him.  Zixx managed a single shot, and good for him, Lusiel thought.  Zixx should be righteously proud to have done so much when he met his end.

The blaster shot went far to her left, singing the bars of one of the nearby and empty cages. ThenLusiel's lightsaber flashed dark red against his skin one final time, and Zixx collapsed in a heap right there in front of Durmat’s cage and everything was quiet again. Except for Durmat, of course, who’d started blubbering as he went to his knees in the cage and futilely reached through its bars as he begged Zixx to get up.  Lusiel regarded the cyborg amusedly, as she considered the stenciled box they would put Zixx inside now.  Big block letters that read ZIXX, she hoped.

But she didn’t laugh aloud right then.  Lusiel continued to play the game, gathering herself as she turned to face Durmat’s burbling, tearful frame there on the floor of his cage.  She activated her saber and stepped closer, except Durmat threw himself backwards against the back of the cage as he really started crying.  Really, he was lucky he was so small and skinny, because the cage they'd put him in was incredibly cramped, she thought suddenly. But he was still a sputtering mess as he stumbled to his feet to face her.

"Please, please … I know why you're here. The Republic's investigating my dad and they're sending an agent here to question me. But I swear! I won’t tell them nothing! I won't break, I won't! I'm a … hic … yea, I’m a rock!"  Durmat wrapped his arms all around his torso.  As if to defend himself in some small, pitiful way.  Lusiel shook her head at him.

"You must think I'm an idiot." Behind her, Vette snorted softly. Lusiel reminded herself of the game and resolutely ignored any attempt Vette might make to entice from her even a chuckle.

"Fine, I think you're an idiot. Hey!  If you let me live, I'll think anything you want me to!"  Durmat implored her, implored!  Lusiel dug her teeth into her lip, certain she would lose it right then and there. Worse, the boy continued.  "Look, my father's done so much for the Empire. Maybe the apple fell off the tree, kinda far from the tree, but the apple's still … the apple's still … look, I don't exactly know where I'm going with the apple thing but pl … oh, balls!  Shit, please don't kill me."

Lusiel decided she'd lost the game, that Durmat proved the winner in their brief exchange.  There simply wasn’t anyway to concede different after Durmat’s shaking commentary.  Apples and trees, indeed. Someday she would rise above such petty entertainments. Perhaps.  For now, she shrugged at the terrified, trembling boy, "So what would you have me do? There's no way you can be left to tell your tale." And she listened as he described the tests conducted at this facility, the drug that worked to ruin all memories in the subjects they used it on. How many patients were tested using such a drug before the Republic decided it was too risky to field, Lusiel wondered suddenly. No matter, however. She waved Vette towards gathering the necessary items, barely watching as the twi’lek scrambled to comply before Lusiel changed her mind and slaughtered the fool boy.

By then, Durmat was brainlessly describing his pitiful memories outloud, trying to enjoy them while he could.  And Lusiel was suddenly angry, only because the memories he described in those brief moments were sweet, precious things. Her own mind flashed, an image illuminated for one bright moment in her own memory - a woman, her long flowing blonde hair flowing down the length of her back, her dress clinging wetly red to her body, red everywhere, it was blood, the red was blood, the heavy sculpture upheld in her hand going up and down and more blood flying everywhere, until she stopped, looked at what she'd done and screamed wildly, madly, over and over again -- until there was the sound of crashing glass and the screams suddenly stopped.

"Here, take the drug and be done with it, before I change my mind," Lusiel demanded, suddenly bitter, thrusting the syringe through the bars of the cramped cage.

"All right, all right! Here goes nothing." Durmat pressed the syringe against his arm and Lusiel listened, bored, to the sound of the medicine being released from the device, a slow, steady hiss.   Until it was done. Durmat groaned, pained, and then he collapsed.  Again.  Lusiel wondered if he’d ever manage to keep his feet under him, rather.  But she just stood there, looking bored as the boy tiredly raised his head and clambered back to his feet. He looked at her, dazed, “Hi … uhh.  Who are you?” Lusiel stared at him, her arms crossed over her chest.

"I'm your inquisitor. Tell me about Commander Rylon," Lusiel demanded.

"I wish I could help you … but I don't know what that is."

Lusiel reached out to him using the force, judging the truth of his words. Baras was much better at such a task, of course.  He’d made a veritable livelihood from his skill at discerning people’s truths, a rather impressive stable of information providers that littered the entire wide galaxy. But her own skills were not meaningless. Lying to any Sith was a singularly difficult thing to do, and so she’d practiced lying to countless examples of them over the years.  Lusiel finally realized the trick was to hide one's secrets amongst a smattering of truths, so that they never knew which was lie and which was true.  So they hesitated to actually act, just on the off-chance of guessing right. But this boy could hardly understand so much. In fact, he stood there blankly considering her, just blinking, like a droid wiped clean and ready for a new program.

Nodding at him, Lusiel declared her task done and turned away, certain she would never see him again.  Because why would such a thing ever prove necessary, after all.  Durmat called after her stupidly, "Okay, then.  I’ll see you tomorrow then, I guess.  Bye!"

Vette was no help at all. "Wow, I wish there was some more of that drug. There are some memories I wish I could get rid of." Lusiel stared at her, cool and silent.  Remembering.

"Indeed."


	6. Flirtations Galore

"No!  Damn it!  Not in my cantina!"

Too late, Vette thought, watching the Imperial pilot-turned-spy choke out his last gasps of air as Lusiel twisted the Force around his neck. Not that Vette felt sorry for the schmuck left draped over the cantina table in Sobrik, dead as dead can be. No, anyone who would act stupidly enough to steal Imperial plans in order to sell them to the rebels here on Balmorra or, even worse, the Republic – hey, that kind of idiot got off rather easy having his neck broken by a particularly moody Sith, if anyone bothered asking Vette’s opinion. This particular bozo even used his pretty face to wheedle information from heedless, bored military wives stuck at Sobrik, that left them vulnerable to having their own necks snapped like sticks, too.  Somehow that made the guy even more awful, actually. 

And, hey, the act at least soothed some of Lusiel's angst. Or maybe it was the fruity drink she sipped as they cleaned up the mess his corpse made over the railing of the bar.  Vette was able to finagle some really damn expensive brandy after the Force-choking session was concluded, at least.  So Lusiel’s mood was improved by one or the other.  Small blessings, that's what counted.

"So you feeling better, my lord?"

"Have I been feeling poorly, then?  Truly, whyever would you think so, Vette?"

"Uh, never mind." Vette watched as cantina workers carried away the dangling corpse, with that ugly broken neck of his flopping all around. Everyone else in the cantina was giving the pair of women a wide berth. "Just don't think I'm going to be given the chance to enjoy a rousing social atmosphere tonight and I was so looking forward to it."

Lusiel sat there, sipping her beverage and sullenly considering the wide eyes of the cantina patrons who dared look her way. Suddenly amused, she smirked evilly at one nasty-looking bastard who checked to see is blaster was still tucked up against his side.  Lusiel wiggled her own fingers in his direction and the man yelped aloud.  Vette laughed wildly when the fellow jumped to his feet, his eyes wide and frantic before he rushed to leave the cantina.

"Hey!  I bet he doesn't return for a month!" Vette couldn't stop laughing.

"That's me, Vette. Teetotaler extraordinaire! Cantina owners beware! I will clear your establishments with mere waves of my itty bitty fingers," Lusiel muttered quietly, before raising her hands into the air at her sides to shake her fingers back and forth. Vette nearly fell off her stool, laughing. Lusiel only smiled.

Vette eventually quieted and looked over at Lusiel. "So, uh. Why'd you let that kid live, my lord? Back there in that Republic jail. If you don't mind me asking, I mean."

Lusiel shrugged. "He made me laugh."  She certainly wasn’t going to admit to Vette any sort of kind emotion, after all.  And never mind her own bonds with her brother, nurtured over so many years.  Sith didn’t describe their family ties easily and certainly not openly.  What you loved became a blunt-edged weapon against the Sith who was that damned stupid, Lusiel thought.

Vette sat back, wondering if it was truly so simple.  Perhaps it was, or maybe it was at least partly so.  Lusiel had a keenly wicked sense of humor, even if she was able to bite it back so no one else could see it.  Vette knew she appealed to that part of Lusiel prone to a laughter she could not overtly demonstrate. Which was too bad, really. A world where laughter that wasn't based on diabolical cruelty but rather forced into obscurity seemed incredibly sad to Vette. Maybe if more Sith laughed aloud, fewer kids would have to be killed just because their fathers were idiot spies. Vette shrugged, though. Probably not.

"Come on, Vette. Time to face the master once again," Lusiel pushed herself away from the table and strode towards the cantina entrance. Vette chuckled as she watched various patrons breathe sighs of relief to see her go.

Lusiel looked ahead, towards the barracks that was their destination, thinking back to the handsome Lieutenant Quinn. He really did have the most incredible eyes, she thought. Never let it be said, that she wasn’t incredibly partial to a man in uniform.

"What did you call Quinn earlier today? Stick-up-his … what?" Lusiel grinned over at Vette.

"Why? Are you thinking to yank it out of there, my lord?"

Lusiel grinned at her as they both entered the barracks, Vette trailing just behind her. Her eyes adjusted quickly to the low light of the inner rooms, punctuated by blinking of small red and yellow lighted buttons off various terminals.  Quinn was perched at his normal work location on the far side of building, and he lifted his chin in her direction respectfully, she saw. Some other soldiers milled about various computer relays and consoles; a few even stopped what they were doing to consider her with some small degree of awed wonder. Lusiel plastered a hard, serenely cold look on her face and approached the Lieutenant, striding across the center of the room resolutely.

"My lord, I observed your progress at the Republic control station. I was greatly impressed. I hadn't thought your chance at success to be very high.  Although at the time, I was judging you a typical Sith and I see now such a word should never be applied to you. I will ensure any future calculations I make will take your true ability into account." Quinn noticed Vette's grinning visage from her vantage behind the Sith. The blue twi’lek was smirking merrily at him and subtly shaking her head, actually.  Quinn briefly wondered if he’d said something to offend Lord Lusiel.  But no, Lusiel seemed purely pleased, rather.

"Quinn, you know just what to say!"

Vette muttered something that sounded like, "Oh brother." But Lusiel ignored her, watching Quinn as he admitted with obvious diffidence, "I'm not too proud to admit when I'm wrong." Lusiel's Force awareness roused itself, reaching out to try sensing the Imperial’s feelings. Quinn was embarrassed, he wanted to prove himself.  That was normal of any Imperial and definitely a sign of personal pride in Quinn himself – but overlying it all was an incredible sense that a correction was required, even if it was difficult to offer, and perhaps _especially_ because it was difficult. He was apologizing to her.  Not because she might punish or otherwise harm him. But, rather, because he was genuinely sorry for the misjudgment. Lusiel was … touched. Not a familiar feeling.

She felt herself flounder and it was at that moment Quinn mentioned Darth Baras was waiting to address her in the privacy of the next room.  Well, damn it. Lusiel knew she was scowling unhappily at the prospect of speaking to Baras, and it was obvious enough to Quinn.  Well, at least the room he pointed her towards was his own private quarters, and outside the understanding of the other soldiers in the place. How interesting. Lusiel nodded, gathering herself before turning to move into the designated room. Vette followed her slowly, not looking forward to the coming confrontation.

Vette knew Lusiel really hated Baras, that it ran deep, and this despite the fact Lusiel never openly denounced her master. At least not to her, although Vette suspected Lusiel didn’t truly share counsel with anyone at all.  She kept her feelings close to hand, away from anyone’s real notice. Lusiel was especially careful when she spoke to anyone about Baras, never mind how she spoke _to_ him. Vette wasn't sure what really inspired Lusiel's hate of the man, had assumed it was some natural Sith proclivity since they seemed to feel most comfortable hating each other.  But Vette knew Lusiel hated Baras even before she retrieved Vette from her jail cells on Korriban, and she’d only just become Baras’ apprentice at that point.

It had something to do with one of Lusiel's instructors, Vette believed. Not that Lusiel actually spoke of the incident. She only pressed a ring into Vette's hand once, insisting the twi’lek keep the thing out of her own sight. There were dark things in Lusiel's memories, things she never shared. And Vette suddenly wondered about that drug again, the one Lusiel gave the boy in that cage.  Vette had supposed she might use the drug, just give her own self a completely fresh chance, like clean her own self.  Now she wondered if she would more quickly offer that kind of peace to Lusiel, rather.

Vette glanced at the Sith quickly. Lusiel's face was blank once again, her earlier pleasing flushness born from flirting with the lieutenant just dissipated. Vette sighed, as she admitted what a sap she really was.  Because she'd give Lusiel the drug in a heartbeat. And what exactly did that say about how she really regarded the Sith? _Vette_ , she told herself – _you are hopeless_.

Lusiel approached the nearby console, facing the image of her master there determinedly. Vette took the chance to glance around the quarters themselves. Figures, she thought. There wasn't a single item in the room out of place or even mussed. The man was a robot. Stick up his backside, indeed. She shook her head and diverted her attention to the confrontation Lusiel was enduring with Darth Baras.

"I'm sure you can see the smile on my face, apprentice. You're turning me into a true believer," Baras intoned. Vette shuddered suddenly as she remembered the way Baras screamed when the Republic SIS agent he was torturing refused to give him what he want. Baras seemingly happy turned out to be just as obscene, as when he was frustrated.  The guy was just plain gross, Vette thought.

Apparently Lusiel felt the same way and she shook her head towards the holoimage, disgusted. Lusiel drawled, "Just quit buttering me up. What would you have me do next?" Vette hid her smile at the snarky response. Few could have gotten away with it, actually. Baras seemed indifferent to Lusiel’s animosity, rather.  He once remarked to one of his aides as they left his offices on Dromund Kaas, that Lusiel acted precisely as some Sith enforcer should.  Not with polite niceties but directly, with bluntness, strength and assured power. 

Now the two Sith bantered back and forth, plotting the ultimate destruction of one particular Commander Rylon, off in some Arms Factory of all things. Vette ignored much of it, actually, catching only bits and pieces. Baras insisted, "Lay waste to everyone there." Honestly, what more could possibly be said after that sort of direction? Soon enough, though, and really thank goodness, the image of Baras was gone and Vette felt safe enough to breathe again.  Lusiel slowly rolled her shoulders, and Vette wondered after Lusiel’s tiredness, hoped the Sith didn’t collapse as they both waited for Quinn to reappear.  Which didn’t take over-long, at least.  Vette frowned at him as he ducked inside the private space. Did the man ever _not_ work?

"My lord, I've prepared a series of schematics describing the interior of the Balmorran Arms Factory. An incursion into the facility will be a monumental feat. I'm excited by the prospect of you destroying the place."

Lusiel smiled at Quinn, "I excite you, then?  I’m beyond gratified to know that." Quinn stumbled. Vette was surprised he didn't fall over, in fact. He even clutched himself as if to regain his balance. She couldn't help but grin widely as he stammered a response to the Sithy attention focused on him right then.  Vette noticed the shift of the Imperial’s legs, though, realized he was surprised.  But it didn’t stop him from responding just as any normal guy would, when a pretty woman looks at them like that.  Vette was slightly happy to note Quinn wasn’t completely the stiff board of propriety he portrayed.  Human enough, at least.

He even stammered.  "Well, what I meant was … when I imagine all the ways you'll shape the galaxy … I get very excited, yes."

Lusiel seemed particularly inspired.  Vette realized she was playing a game of fun with the Imperial, most likely to shake loose of the unpleasantness that came of dealing with Baras and his demands.  That Quinn was able to please Lusiel, probably as much as any fruity drink in the cantina, made Vette eye the man in a slightly different light.  If only because Lusiel obviously liked him, and not just for his pretty face, either.  Which seemed to inspire Lusiel to even greater levels of teasing, apparently.  It was pretty funny to watch, at least.

"Oh, just admit it. You quite like me, Quinn.  It’s delightfully obvious," Lusiel insisted, coyly.

"My lord, please.  Is this an appropriate time and place for such an inquiry? You're putting me in a very awkward position."

"Why would your quarters be inappropriate for this discussion?  I would think we might both be in prime positions here, actually."

Quinn actually blushed, probably imagining those various positions.  It definitely kept him from prevaricating with Lusiel, at the least.  He even stammered, "I'll ... Well, yes.  I can grant you that. It's not the place, I suppose. But rather the time that leaves something to be desired."

Lusiel won the game.  Vette saw it happen, like a click of a switch falling simply into place. Lusiel was completely satisfied, as if she’d just walked off the field clutching whatever prize she was determined upon.  She looked that way on Dromund Kaas, when they emerged from the Dark Temple.  It wasn’t keeping herself from laughing aloud, either.  It was, that Quinn tacitly admitted he did like her.  Why it was so valuable to Lusiel, well that was a real mystery.  But she really did seem as utterly happy as any Sith ever could, too.

Seriously, Vette pondered them both  as she stood there watching the entire absurd encounter play out in front of her.  Years later, she would say that was the moment Lusiel fell in love with the stick in the mud Imperial.  At the time, though, all she could do was dazedly wonder how Quinn could’ve ever evoke such a silly female expression on her Sith’s face.


	7. Through the Battlefield

"A Sith! No one fights like a Sith! My lord, a moment of your time!"

Lusiel sighed, turning to face the agitated soldier as the muck and dust of the field swirled angrily around her. The sound of blaster fire and artillery bursts was a constant refrain and everyone was forced to yell in order to be heard. The day had been composed of one shouting match after another with countless soldiers all the way from the base camp in the Sundari Flatlands where the shuttle deposited her and Vette to this very tired and dirty stop.

She glanced up just in time to see a blazing explosive sizzle its way across the sky en route to … heh, looked like a shot from a friendly gun, as the artillery shot hit squarely what looked like a Republic crawler. The thing exploded into a blazing inferno, complete with troopers scrambling out in a mad heaping rush. Not everyone made it, she noticed.  Which added a particularly foul stench to the scene, too.

"My lord!"

Vette's lekku were trembling, Lusiel saw.  Although she seemed to ignore her slave’s discomfort and fear as she gave her full attention to the shouting man in front of her, and the officer noted the directness.  Strength in that, he thought.  He crouched down, hunkering in a depression some explosion had made in the ground a long time earlier. Lusiel could tell, only because the dirt was no longer a rich brown but a tired grey color, instead. But the hole worked to provide some sad cover now and she leaned closer to the Imperial officer and disregarding his sweat-stained, grimy frame. She only listened as he described the absolute horror the nearby Republic guns were reaping on the Empire's soldiers. Lusiel paid close attention as he pinpointed the location of the guns on her map and then she shot him a dark smile.

"You're right, you know. No one in the universe fights like a Sith. I will destroy the guns."

Vette followed her as they moved out of the cover the depression provided, approaching the long line of rebel defenses. Lusiel scanned the line, searching for the various targets the soldiers who'd directed her all day had described. She quickly discerned several immense battle droids, the correct number of artillery guns, and a host of enemy soldiers – all of them stood between her and the arms factory housing her targets, both Commander Rylon and now some idiot Darth Lachris had called Cheketta, a supposed Republic general who'd deserted to help defend the Balmorran resistance. Next to her, Vette unslung both her blasters, checking to ensure they were in working order, before slanting her a wicked smile. Lusiel was grateful the twi’lek didn't try to blare words of encouragement outloud, just to hide her anxious appraisal of the battlefield.

It was going to be a long day. Better not to jinx themselves, right?

* * *

 

Lieutenant Malavai Quinn had a very particular routine to his thoughts, as he did to his schedule. He would methodically organize his attention, dividing his thoughts into what seemed, to him, the rooms of a house where he moved through each space only as needed. When focused on any particular task, he mentally planted himself in that single room and firmly shut the doors leading away or apart from that particular place in his consideration. Today, however, one particular door refused to remain shut and every so often, it seemed that glimmers of light from that area of his mind would demand his attention.

Surely she had been only teasing him, prodding merely to see how it is he would react. Maybe it was a test of sorts, some effort she was making to ensure he was capable of keeping focused on the matters at hand. He was fairly certain he had not angered her, at least. She even smiled somewhat, seeming pleased and happy as she withdrew from his quarters. He was not so positive he had ably acquitted himself, felt more embarrassed still than personally impressed.  Discomfiture was not a state Quinn was particularly familiar with, anyway, and he had only responded clumsily to her provocative overtures. Although he didn’t believe he would be required to repeat the performance, either. She couldn't possibly be truly attracted to him. He paused, thinking. Could she?

"Sir!  We have brief reports from patrols outside Sundari basecamp. They read, only, that Sith are arrived on the battlefield outside the Balmorran Arms Factory."

Quinn shut the mental door labeled "Lord Lusiel is a woman" and returned his attention to the more imperative room called "get the job done". And why was that particular mental exercise so difficult, he wondered.  It was that particular Sith, he feared.  He focused on the matter at hand.  "They would want to agitate the rebels' fears, of course. That's why they're keeping the reports vague. But it does let us know she's there." Quinn examined the tracking devices he had targeting the Jedi agent chasing down Lord Lusiel’s same target and felt assured the figure was not adversely threatening her current progress.

"Sir! Rebel communications reporting attacks on their defensive positions! Artillery positions are being destroyed, they're saying. One message cut off in mid-transmission indicates a Sith only just destroyed a heavy battle droid.  On her own … Damn me, can you believe it?" Quinn heard distinct murmurs from several of his soldiers about the size and destructive power of those battle droids outside the arms factory. He smiled when he heard one soldier mutter in an aside, "Sounds like the droid being destroyed was the least of that fool's worries." There was reason to follow the Sith, he reminded himself. The powerful were made to lead he believed, as it only strengthened the whole.

Quinn had faithfully served Darth Baras directly over the several years since the Battle of Druckenwell. That service had preserved his career and, quite likely, his very life. No, the strength of even one Sith, to him, was well-proven and beyond measuring in value. He would not fail either of these Sith that he served.  Not today.

* * *

 

Lusiel's innate sense of humor was flagging as she finally faced the whining figure of Grand Marshal Cheketta, leader of Balmorra's resistance. Perhaps it was the smoking corpses of the two Jedi he'd kept with him for a final pitiful defense. Not that she was overly upset the Republic was lying about its assistance to the resistance because, really, lying and being lied to was little more than business in the world of the Sith.

No, what truly bothered Lusiel was Cheketta's physical presence, guarded by two powerful figures and far from any line, whether offensive or defensive. He stood there, begging for lives he should have been leading, standing not in front of the ones he now asked be saved but far from them and, thus, utterly incapable of doing anything to defend them.

Cheketta failed at the most basic rule of leadership. The one that had you actually _lead_ rather than _run away_. Lusiel was disgusted and she told him so, right before her lightsaber flashed crimson over his face. An Imperial soldier approached just as Cheketta's corpse joined those of his one-time Jedi guards. "My lord, we have the facility under control but pockets of fighting remain. We will work to solidify our hold."

"I'm seeking one of those pockets, actually. Tell me, where are you hardest pressed?"


	8. Traitor Unmasked

_"Target is carving a bloody path in this direction. Unconfirmed reports indicate it's a Sith, sir."_ Quinn frowned when the first scratchy messages emerged from those devices linking him to the Jedi agent's movements. What manner of inadvertent messages was he receiving right then?  But he waved aside his men's concern, only bent over his monitors as he worked at discerning what sort of interference the exchange indicated.

 _"Consider them confirmed."_ Quinn cocked his head when he recognized Lusiel's voice, easily recognized from the sliced devices tracking the Jedi. How was such a thing possible? How could he hear the communications transmitted at the factory? Quinn was concerned.  Somehow he had missed something.

 _"Commander, the enemy_ is _Sith, repeat…"_

 _"I can see that through the damn security vids, Captain. Just shut up."_ Quinn carefully ran through what amounted to a full diagnostic scan of every one of his tracking devices, looking for the source of the incoming transmission. He worked quickly, his fingers almost flying over the holoterminal in front of him.

 _"Sith, I know why you're here. Be aware these are the finest troops I've commanded in all my decades of duty."_ It was definitely Rylon, apparently talking through the Factory’s own communications systems.  The transmission was incredibly clear when he was the one speaking but became tinny whenever someone responded to him.

 _"Oh my, then.  Should I turn tail and run, do you think?"_  It was Lusiel again.  Quinn actually smiled towards the speakers, even as a couple of his men there behind him whooped quietly. Lusiel’s audacity was quite as gorgeous as she was and just as evident right then.

 _"My men and I would be disappointed if you did. Captain Eligyn, hold the line. I'm coming with reinforcements. Rylon out."_ Then Quinn could hear nothing more than the sounds of buttons pressing, footsteps moving across a metallic floor, and then a door opening and closing again. Rylon! He was listening to Commander Rylon's movements, so that he heard Lord Lusiel only through Rylon's communication with the soldiers, there. The Jedi agent must have bugged Commander Rylon, which in turn gave Quinn the chance to monitor the man, as well. An unexpected development but hardly too troubling, Quinn supposed.

Quinn eased back against the seat where he rested, certain the situation was well in hand. At least he now understood Lusiel had, in fact, engaged her targets and the mission was proceeding precisely according to plan. Whatever threat the Republic commander posed to Lord Baras would soon be eliminated. He only waited, listening to the monitors intently at the sound of Rylon’s footsteps hurrying along the hallways of the distant factory.

 _"Please, enough of this,"_ Rylon said eventually, his voice cracking over the speakers.

 _"Commander, no. Run! Save yourself!"_ The soldier's voice was thick with pain. The man was obviously wounded, and the Imperials gathered in Quinn’s headquarters space cheered lightly at this renewed evidence of Lord Lusiel’s prodigious skill.  She’d single-handedly destroyed an entire squad of Republic troops!  Quinn breathed out a slow huffed sound of satisfaction.

 _"Just put him out of his misery, Sith,"_ Rylon insisted. Quinn heard Lusiel murmuring a kind of agreement, saying the soldier had suffered enough.  Then her lightsaber flared loudly through the monitors. There was a swooshing sound, a gasp, and the heady thump of a body hitting the floor. Rylon was speaking again, _"It's too bad they were on the wrong side. They were excellent soldiers and exceptional men."_ Quinn leaned forward, intent as Lord Lusiel spoke in agreement with the Commander. Behind him, his men fell silent, everyone listening carefully to the exchange.

 _"This is a bittersweet day. I served for the glory of the Empire. But the life of a spy is a slippery one. In essence, I had to become a Republic soldier. And I've done things against the Empire that sickened me."_ The men behind Quinn gasped loudly.  But Quinn’s entire body tightened into readiness.  He pursed his lips, suddenly and brilliantly adamant. He spun rapidly around, pointing a finger at the nearest one of his men.  Quinn snarled at him, "Lock down that signal! Ensure there's absolutely no chance it can be transmitted anywhere! Make no mistake! If that information goes anywhere, I will personally kill the one who let it loose!"

"Yes, sir!" The men began scrambling, madly rushing to their various consoles and pressing buttons galore, everyone working to ensure the devastating information was uncompromised. Quinn returned his attention to the conversation between Rylon and Lord Lusiel.

_"But for the greater good, Commander."_

_"I have lived believing – no, hoping – that was the case, my lord. Today was inevitable. I knew Lord Baras would eventually have to eliminate me. But I'm proud to have been able to serve him all this time._

_"As I'm honored to be the one to kill you."_

_"Before I meet my end, there is one thing I must know,"_ Rylon's voice sounded choked, pained. _"My son. He was the only thing in this world that was truly mine. I should have spared him the truth, should have saved him from my own fate.  I … I know you had to cover my tracks, but, please … tell me. Is he …?"_

Quinn held his breath for a moment, as Lusiel paused _. "He lives, Commander.  He only sacrificed his every remembering, to save himself.  He told me some of it beforehand, remembered your pride in him as hard as he could before I administered the dosage."_

_"Good.  You do well by me today, do not doubt that.  I thank you for all you do now, know that you’ll cut me down and that’s all right.  Only, when they find me here it must be a fight that took me.  Better to hide the truth of what the Empire gained through me over the years that way.  I can not hold back now."_

_"I'd have it no other way."_

_"Then arm yourself. Tell Lord Baras … I was honored to serve him."_

Quinn heard the sounds of their battle engaged - grunts and gasps, the rush and swirl of a lightsaber and the steady staccato fire from a blaster. But he had no time to waste. He verified the security of the transmission, imagined the agent's panic over her inability to transmit the data.  "The Jedi's agent will move to flee. Work to close all avenues of escape. Bottleneck her! She must be captured immediately!" Quinn tossed the directions to his men and then reached for his personal commlink.


	9. Stop the Agent

Lusiel stared at Quinn's holographic visage in terrible and angry dismay. Burning through her mind was a vivid image -- a man strapped to a table as Baras delightedly tortured him and Vette pressing her thin lekku-framed head between her own shoulder blades, trembling in fear and disgust. Baras would punish Lusiel severely if that agent managed to get the information off-world. But he wouldn’t break Lusiel, because Lusiel served his purpose for now.  No, Baras would tear Vette to pieces right in front of her.  Just a brilliant lesson in what happened when Lusiel failed.

Behind her now, Vette shifted and stayed quiet.  Lusiel was grateful for that much, because she wanted to yell and shout at someone.  She certainly did not fool herself.  Baras knew Lusiel valued the twi’lek. She'd kept her, after all. That was enough. Nor did Vette offer much in the grand scheme to destroy Nomen Karr.  She was easily and simply replaced, really.  Just another twi’lek slave no one would worry about in the end.  No, Baras would easily hurt whatever people Lusiel made herself responsible for, and right now that was Vette. Toovee didn't count. Mostly because she wouldn't care if his damned voice box was destroyed forever.

Lusiel squared herself, refusing to even consider that Baras would use her own brother against her.  For now, he was shielded by the Dark Council’s regard and use of Imperial Intelligence.  No, it was _Vette_ who was vulnerable right then.  The Jedi agent needed to be destroyed. There was no other recourse left.

"All is not lost, my lord," said Quinn. "She was heading to her ship, but I had my men move in to cut her off from the Republic landing bay. I am systematically blocking her avenues of transmission and escape, herding that Republic scum to her only hope – the spaceport at Sobrik."

"I will be there soon," Lusiel promised, aching with the sense of gratitude she felt for Quinn right then.  _How wonderful you are_ , she thought as she watched his features twinkling over top of her commlink.

"There is more, my lord. My men report the agent is wielding a lightsaber. It seems this investigator is actually Jedi, an experienced Knight. I advise caution when facing her."  Quinn seemed to almost lean closer, as if he was trying to reach through the transmission and touch her.  Lusiel wasn’t inclined to accept comfort right then, though.

She just shrugged slightly. It mattered little to her what role the agent played in the game, past her identity as "greatest threat facing me at this moment". The Jedi needed to die, her information kept secure. It was really that simple.

* * *

 

The Jedi's pattered nonsense about escaping to Tython, to seek out so-called redemption.  For only a moment Lusiel's irreverent wit sparked. Not that it was ever truly muzzled. Lusiel could find the droll in just about any situation.

And there it was, in the dry, suppressed voice of this Jedi. This idiot who thought to tempt her with something she called peace coming through monotonous service to a pitifully ungrateful Republic that doomed itself to suffer chaotic disruptions and constant turmoil. There was no real order, no defining strength that kept the whole, not there.  No set, defined path which made sense enough to her. Just a long series of fools floundering and fighting as much against themselves as they ever did the Empire. In fact, the Empire provided the Republic's one saving grace, the balance to their madness, the only thing that, in opposition, kept them together. Without the Sith, the Jedi would have no reason for being. Really, it was just pitiable.

"Save your breath, Jedi. You're going to need it," Lusiel really did wag a finger towards the fool woman. She wasn’t surprised when the Jedi fought the inevitable, and Lusiel found particular satisfaction in making her blade sparkle against the length of another lightsaber.  The song whirled discordant notes in the heavy air over their heads.  And Lusiel's body swayed and moved, thrilling through her lightsaber’s crooning, the red glare that provided such a sweet note, a counterpoint to the sad whisper of her opponent's blade. It was almost ended too quickly, and the Jedi left leaning tiredly against her wounded side.

"So deal the deathblow, Sith," the Jedi remained defiant in the face of death. Which might have been admirable, except the woman started boasting right then.  “You’re too late.  I already sent my recordings to Nomen Karr, you’re too late!”  Lusiel felt her chest tighten with anxiety enough it was palpable and the Jedi jerked her attention to Lusiel’s own burning eyes, the fury that flared so brightly there.  Lusiel tightened her fingers around the handle of her blade, prepared to strike against the foul woman in a fit of rage as her mind screamed out against her own failure.

“Actually, you’re wrong," Quinn announced, emerging from the shadows of the nearby doorway with several Imperial soldiers. He paused only briefly as he considered them there. "I could lie and tell you I’m sorry.  But I’m rather reveling in the chance to say, how I intercepted your transmission. Your masters in the Republic know _nothing_." Lusiel felt warmth and satisfaction flood her as she watched him then, felt the spark of arousal pulse in her lower belly until her sex burned with hot desire for the Imperial.  She didn’t imagine any other man had ever looked so perfect as Quinn did right then.

Lusiel didn’t even try to hide her bursting satisfaction. "Quinn, I could kiss you."

She sensed his pleasure at the compliment. But Quinn responded with solid brevity. "I’ve only done as I was directed, my lord. I was watching her the entire time. There was never any risk at all."  Lusiel sensed some level of untruth in the statement, knew he’d struggled more than he admitted.  She admired him for _that_ , too.

But the Jedi only looked even more tired.  She shook her head, still stupidly calm in the face of her impending doom. "Gloat all you like, it means nothing. I remain at peace. Nomen Karr and his padawan will still destroy you."  Lusiel was quite tired of the woman. Or maybe she was just quite tired. It didn't really matter, Lusiel supposed. She pointed at the Jedi. "I will _savor_ your destruction this day, Jedi.”

"There is no death," my boot, she thought.  And her blade glowed as brilliant blood-red as her spirit right then.


	10. Slipping Up

Baras was fuming. Lusiel knew her master well enough to appreciate his state of agitation, mask or no. Oh, perhaps she should have returned to the barracks faster. Although she didn't even mull over that outrageous consideration. Honestly, if she hadn't taken the time to wash and get something to eat after the gods-awful time she had so far endured on Balmorra, she might have been unable to stop herself from telling Baras what she really thought of him. Right there in front of Quinn, no less.

Of course, looking at Quinn standing there provided her something to indulge in, too. Even if he was tense when she came into the room. No wonder, considering Baras' rotund holographic self looming like that over the holoterminal.  Quinn might have turned it off and pretended some strange machine malfunction when Baras complained.  Hell, Quinn would probably get away with it, even.

Quinn was addressing Baras as she strolled up behind him. "But it's not my place, my lord. I leave that to your apprentice to convey." At least that saved Quinn from Baras' continued attention.  Lusiel smiled tightly when Baras shifted his gaze towards her.

Baras spoke, his tone censorious. "How nice you managed to join us. Quinn refuses to update me, insisting that only you be the one to tell me what’s happened. I will assume the Jedi investigator has been stopped."

Lusiel raised her chin, "Quinn killed her transmission, and I killed her.  It’s finished."

"You were careless, rather.  That’s the only reason for scrambling to repair the situation.  But … since you quelled it, we can move on," Baras waved one of his pudgy hands through the air and Lusiel felt her breaths moving slowly again. Her people were safe, she thought.  She didn’t even glance at either Vette or Quinn, only then realizing she was thinking of Quinn as her own. Soft happiness bubbled inside of her, made her heedless and less than circumspect. In later years, she would wonder if things might have worked so much different if she did not paint some a mark on Quinn's back in the moments that followed.

But then she always reminded herself, that the tremendous challenge also won her the greatest prize.  Nothing worth having came freely, always carried a high price.  And if she had done anything else, Baras never would have offered Quinn up to her then.  For everything she regretted, she was glad she won so much over her fat tub of a master.

"So tell me, then.  How you would asses Quinn's contribution?" Baras queried her, intentfully watching her. 

She would have realized, should have realized.  But she spoke truly, "Lieutenant Quinn is an exceptional officer. I couldn't have done it without him." She looked over at Quinn, watching as he accepted the praise with solemn dignity. Lord, she truly liked the man.

Lusiel's feelings were raw and bare, rather than obscured by her ordinary disrespect for her master. The truth was she was exhausted, practically wilting there in front of the holoterminal. Combined with the powerful pleasure she'd enjoyed from Quinn's support against the Jedi, Lusiel simply lacked the ability to blur her inclinations towards the officer.

Baras stirred, considering them both carefully. Oh, Quinn's earlier desires had been interesting enough. But this?  That Lusiel shared the attraction, that the man appealed to her so strongly was truly extraordinary. Baras never hesitated when such valuable potential was made clear. His mind swirled with the plans he intended to put into action. Very quickly, he thought as he eyed the pair.  "High praise, indeed. Quinn, I believe you have sufficiently repaid the debt owed to me. I'm putting you up for a captaincy and transmitting an executive order allowing you to station wherever you choose. You are dismissed," Baras said.

Quinn breathed solidly, "Thank you, Lord Baras. Although I would have acted as I did regardless of our past association, as well." Quinn looked at Lusiel, his pleasure obvious. "My lord, before I depart, it's been an extreme honor to serve you. You are the epitome of everything the Empire stands for."

Lusiel smiled at the officer. "You’ve impressed me as well, Quinn.  Trust me."

"I’m glad, and I will hope to cross paths with you again, my lord." After saluting the two Sith one last time, Quinn withdrew from the room.

 _Poor me_ , thought Lusiel, watching Quinn's backside as he left. Now there was nothing left to really enjoy in the moment. She sighed, sensing Vette's amusement before the girl returned to her carefully orchestrated nonchalance behind her.  They were quickly becoming practiced at the scenario when dealing with Baras’ nonsense, Lusiel thought.

Baras clucked his tongue towards the departing Quinn. "He will have his hands full. There are powerful Imperials determined to keep him down." Lusiel wondered at the intransience of the Fates. If only she could destroy the people who truly deserved it, like whatever outrageous Imperial would try to ruin such an officer. His value to the Empire was patently obvious, after all. "Still, if Quinn can overcome them and rise to the station he deserves, there is great hope for our Imperial allies."

Lusiel eyed Baras. It finally occurred to her the man was plotting and that the plots he was hatching in that metal head of his involved Quinn. Baras appreciated moving people he could control into key positions. She wondered how many Imperials were as devoted to Baras as Commander Rylon had been. She wished better for Quinn than that man's end.  "If given the chance, Quinn will excel," she told Baras.

"No matter, it's not worth worrying about. Quinn's affairs are a speck compared to what we face. Your time on Balmorra is done. Return to your ship as soon as you're ready to leave. I'll contact you once you're there."

The image of Baras abruptly faded and both Lusiel and Vette breathed a sigh of relief, nearly in accord. "Well, my lord, that's all done. We're out of here, right? Hey, wanna grab another one of those fruit drinks from the cantina before we jump planet?"

"Maybe we should just commandeer the bartender. There's plenty of room on the Black Wing, after all.  That, and Toovee’s cooking remains abysmal."

"Ah, my lord, it's truly inspiring to see your natural talents towards domination and discipline exercised in such positive ways."


	11. Leaving Balmorra

Datapads lay in scattered heaps across Quinn's desk as he considered the current map of Imperial military assignments when his holotransmitter started chirping, indicating an incoming communication. Quinn didn’t hesitate to receive the communication from Darth Baras, even as it surprised him.  And worried him, if he were perfectly honest.

"Quinn, good. I hoped to speak to you outside the notice of my apprentice. I require your assistance." Baras appraised the officer, trying to discern what fascinated Lusiel where the Imperial was concerned. So much of what Baras hoped to achieve hinged on providing just the right seeds, between the both of them, though.  But he had little doubt of what he might achieve, eradicating one possible threat even as he used her to elevate a valuable ally into a significant position within the highest levels of the Imperial military. He only needed to pull each one of the right strings at precisely the right time.

Quinn nodded at him, "Of course, my lord. I will always remain your most willing servant."

"Exactly as I hope, mind you.  It’s a tremendous trust I am vesting in you, merely asking for this much.”  Baras prodded at the knot of interest he sensed was already there in Quinn, “I require someone close to my apprentice, someone who can assure me of her trustworthiness through regular report.  So many of my enemies seek to misdirect me through falsehoods regarding my own apprentices.  I need you there, on Lusiel’s ship.  Only observing, mind you."

Quinn quickly defended Lusiel, and Baras thrilled to know the man’s emotions were already inclined properly.  He would easily engage Lusiel’s attentions, occupy her as Baras needed her.  Quinn said, "My lord, your apprentice never failed to serve you with distinct honor. I am certain your fears are baseless."

"Be that as it may, I can only look towards every possibility. It is not unusual for me to keep a close eye on some my most promising apprentices. I am only asking that you be my eyes in this regard."

Quinn was well aware that any refusal he gave Lord Baras would be incredibly imprudent of him. The word stupid would be even better, he corrected himself.  Refusing to serve the will and desires of a Sith like Darth Baras was very practically suicidal, in fact.  But he still recoiled at the thought of any perception he acted against Lord Lusiel, even in so limited a manner as this.  He admired her greatly … he thought of the video his monitors captured of her motions in battle, the fluidness of her every curving motion.  And he felt heat and hardness coil in his stomach suddenly, knew his pupils dilated with arousal at the thought of staying so close to her over such a long time.  Quinn curled his shoulders inward, "I see, my lord. She may not be willing to accept me onto her ship, however." A part of Quinn hoped she would refuse him, even.  Save him from the fiery strength of this attraction.  He’d never wanted a woman this way, so much and so fast.

But Baras waved aside his concerns. "She will have you, Quinn.  Lusiel is keenly observant, intelligent, and she’s already noted your value.  She’ll want the advantage you might bring her crew and people.  She knows, too, that you can choose any assignment you desire. It will flatter her female vanity that you've chosen her ship and crew."

Quinn thought back to Lusiel's playful attitude during the briefing in his quarters, knew she was Sith enough to continue such overtures.  But he doubted it was so simple a thing as her mere ego and vanity, as Baras was assuming.  Lusiel didn’t strike him as so much smug and overweening as that, thought she was sharp-witted enough to gather her people – and lovers, too – with more acute prudence, rather. Perhaps he only hoped for so much of her regard, thought he himself would be the one flattered if she challenged the protocols dividing them, all the sundry expectations of their disparate social statuses.  And their ages, too, he reminded himself.  She was so very young!  Nearly two decades divided them!  Surely he was mature enough, with experience enough that he might guide her, protect her even …

Baras saw Quinn's shoulders go back into a position of respectful attention. Behind his mask Baras grinned as the first piece on the board fell neatly into place.

* * *

 

Lusiel couldn't resist. Watching Quinn lowering himself to one knee at her feet was simply too enticing a sight. Especially on the heels of a promise like that, that he would serve her however she wanted.  She smiled down at him, "Whatever capacity I see fit? How exciting."

"More like nauseating," Vette rubbed her forehead, dismayed.

Lusiel eyed her balefully, however. She liked Vette.  But she could not allow such open criticism of her leadership and judgment from anyone of her own people.  "I wouldn't expect a child to understand," Lusiel snapped at her harshly. Vette flushed purple and hung her head down.  Maintaining public attitudes required complete subservience to Lusiel’s will whenever they were moving about openly, she knew that!  Stupid Vette, stupid! 

Vette subsided, nodding subtly at the rebuke.

"My lord, if you provide me this opportunity to prove myself, to help me in rising to that station I know I can achieve – you will not be disappointed," Quinn asserted suddenly, startling Lusiel. She stared at him for long moments, thinking.  Those words … She had spoken almost those very words only hours beforehand. To Baras. 

Lusiel regarded Quinn carefully, using her Force awareness of the Imperial to move against him with her own unique senses.  He was watching her as well, his blue eyes liquid cool in his handsome face.  He looked up at her from his kneeling position, adamant and worried.  That was his overriding feeling, too. He was fervently determined to secure her agreement he join her crew, it was driving him madly. Which only provided her the answers she was looking for, that he was compelled to approach her. 

So Lusiel crossed her arms over her chest, adopting a pensive stance there in front of him. Quinn grew anxious enough, that he started outlining the skills he would offer her as a member of her crew.  None of which concerned Lusiel in the least. Quinn's _abilities_ , she thought, were beyond question. He would prove a valuable asset, his role on her ship beyond worth.

No, this was about Baras’ determination, what it was he wanted from the thing.  _That_ was what concerned Lusiel now. It was patently obvious Baras was seeking to place a set of eyes and ears over her. Only what was Baras hoping to accomplish, really.  Maybe nothing more than some simplest safeguard.  But Lusiel sensed it was more, that Baras had a very particular design in choosing Quinn specifically. She simply couldn't discern what possible gain Baras hoped to have for it. The wisest course would be to refuse Quinn onto her crew, deny Baras his spy.

But, then.  What would come of Quinn should he fail to secure a place on her ship.  If he failed Baras, what would the Darth Lord do to make him pay? Deny him the support he needed to recover from whatever blow his career had taken that landed him on Balmorra in the first place, at least. Lusiel didn't want to imagine the worst that could be done him. Quinn would be ruined. Lusiel recoiled from the idea of it, the mere thought.  Quinn was a fine officer, obviously loyal.  Even if his loyalty was given to a Sith utterly undeserving of it.  To take it from Baras, to have it for herself … The challenge would at least prove a unique diversion in the days ahead. And in the meantime, she might feed Baras whatever illusions she saw fit where her own loyalty was concerned, determine what use he intended to make of Quinn. She would safeguard the Imperial, ensure that he emerged from Baras' machinations secure.

Looking down at Quinn, she thought of what it would be like, to see him on the bridge of her ship each day. Each night, too, maybe. Simply delicious. She carefully bit the inside of her lip, her decision set.  "My lord, I offer my military prowess and every ounce of my strength to your cause," Quinn declared. Lusiel noticed he didn't look at her as he said it. Her amusement was intense but she displayed no sign of it.

Lusiel provided Quinn her ready agreement. She didn't want him to suspect her understanding of his complete role on her ship. Better if he believed she was just interested in having his attractive backside on her bridge, by all means. Especially since she _was_ highly interested in his backside.

She watched him go back, briefly, towards the doorway where he'd stacked two personal bags. Vette sighed loudly, "This is sooo _not_ going to be much fun." Lusiel smiled at her, "I can’t possibly agree with you, Vette.  I intend to be having the most intense fun with that man, there are no words to describe it in public purview." Vette groaned dramatically.

Fun, indeed, Lusiel thought. Let the game begin, you fat bastard.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Finally done with Balmorra, guys, phew. I broke it up as much as possible but really wanted to get the planet done in under 10 chapters. Sorry that didn't happen. Also, forgive me for sticking so often to the game's story itself, but, hey, it's a dang good story. Credit to Bioware's writers for a fine job!


	12. Droids, Aprons and Headaches

Quinn located Lord Lusiel in the ship's mess, early in the morning that first day after they left Balmorra. She was hunkered down in a chair, her head resting in her hands with her arms propped up on the mess table.  She was obviously pained. The twi’lek girl, Vette … Vette sat across the table from Lusiel, both her lekku twitching, as she pushed a plate heaped with various foods across the table towards the Sith. Lusiel just groaned. Quinn might have agreed with her sentiments, as the food didn't look particularly appetizing, a matter he would devote his attention to as soon as possible. But Quinn felt Lusiel's immediate distress was more important.

"It's because you keep missing meals, you know. All that jumping towards the people you have to kill and swinging yer lightsaber … I'm telling you, you burn off more energy than you consume," Vette was saying as Quinn entered the room.

"Vette, please. I do eat."

"Hah, when's the last time you actually ate a full meal?"

The droid standing nearby the food producer helpfully responded to the query. Quinn wasn't sure what was more absurd. The droid's tone or its attire. Someone had draped a red apron around its neck that was emblazoned with a large pink heart and the words, "Everyone loves the cook!" The droid's cheerfulness was entirely appropriate, given the prop. But the absurdity of the situation was striking. Quinn realized after only a moment he'd actually stopped to gape at the machine for some long moments.  "Master ate a meal composed of chunks of nerf beef in brown gravy over a plate of white rice, with green tubers on the side approximately two days, three hours ago, Vette," the droid recited.

Vette waved a finger towards her Sith lord. "See, told you so! You're not eating right!"

"Vette. I've eaten several things since then. Just … not a full meal. We've been running all over the damn place on Balmorra for weeks, remember? You were there! And you ate at the same times I did!"

"First, that wasn't food. It was military rations. Except when we were at Mr. Stick in the Mud's place.  That food was okay.  But even then it was rushed. I think you _inhaled_ that fish stuff they served for lunch that one time! Second, you don’t really eat food. It just sort of disappears into your mouth. Hello! The word is rushed, remember. Finally, you just plain work harder than me. I hang back and shoot blasters. You're the one jumping right in there!"

Vette eyed Lusiel balefully, as Quinn wondered if _he_ was "Mr. Stick in the Mud". Lusiel poked her drooping head up, looking with dark-circled eyes at the twi’lek, before glancing down at the plate of food again. She groaned, "I just can't."

"Perhaps I can be of assistance, my lord." Quinn's remark startled both the women and they looked over to where he was standing, still in the doorway.

"Can you get food down her throat," Vette demanded, glaring at him.

"Actually, I think if her immediate pain was relieved she would be far better able to eat a meal."

"Well, I'm no doctor, so there's no way really to fix her up. Toovee has some healing abilities but his efforts haven't been particularly helpful, either."

Quinn looked at the droid he thought might be the "Toovee" Vette was referring to, draped in that outrageous apron, and wondered what possible use the thing had if it could not produce an appealing meal nor provide adequate healing, either. It seemed to be capable of nothing more than entertainment, and even then it was more annoying than anything else. Perhaps he could adjust its voice parameters. The machine was a debacle.

"I myself have some healing skills, actually," Quinn said.

At this, Lusiel glanced up again, hopeful. "We do have a med bay just behind the bridge. Have you seen it?"

"Of course, my lord. It's stocked quite well."

"That's because no one really goes in there, except to grab some bandages every so often. I think our Kolto stores are completely full, even. I usually opt to visit a clinic on planet," Lusiel admitted.

Quinn shook his head. "That won't be necessary anymore. I assure you, I can provide any medical assistance the crew needs, my lord. Come, I'll show you."

Lusiel gladly followed the captain from the mess, moving down the hall towards the door to the medical bay. Quinn guided her to a nearby table, where he directed her to sit on the cushioned surface. He retrieved various instruments from the cabinets lining the walls, before approaching Lusiel and placed the items carefully within reach.

"You need to remove your robe, my lord. Just the top. I need to examine your lungs and heart, to ensure none of the medicine I might use will upset your system."

Lusiel's lips twitched. "Expose my chest to you, hmmm?"

"As part of a medical examination, yes, my lord."

"Ah, you're not being any fun, Quinn."

Quinn turned and reached for the appropriate scanning tool, as Lusiel peeled the upper part of her robe from her shoulders. The fabric dropped smoothly down her arms and back to pool in a bunch at her hips, leaving Lusiel completely bare from the waist up. It was her creamy breasts Quinn observed as he returned to face her again, the perfect pink buds of her nipples puckered from the sudden exposure to a cold room.

Quinn swallowed, staring, certain of exactly two things. One, that no woman, ever, had such absolutely flawless breasts as Lusiel Phyre did. They seemed as if made to fit perfectly in the palms of his hands, even, he thought wildly. And, two, no military protocol on any world or among any species could save him from making an utter ass of himself right then. He felt himself panting. Yes, like a dog.

He raised his eyes to meet her gaze, finally, and Lusiel sighed. Quinn's eyes had actually darkened, until the blue appeared so deep it reminded her suddenly of the way the space around a star appeared through the ship's forward windows. Just _almost_ blue, she thought. She had long thought his eyes gorgeous. But this? Definitely something she'd need to see again. And again. She wondered if she could just keep his eyes that color. Could a man survive constant desire? Could she?  Well, Quinn was clinical. Maybe he'd agree to help her find out. Just ... not right now.

"Quinn, if I wasn't sure my head was about to explode from this pain, I would say something particularly engaging. I might even take your hand and put it where I want it to be. But I'm really hurting."

Quinn shook himself, looking away in order to focus on his work, scanning the Sith's torso for breathing and heartbeat sounds. His work was methodical as he mentally berated himself. Not even a full day passed, not even one day! The thump of her heart came through the scanner clearly. As he thought, Lusiel was incredibly healthy. He noted several scars on her chest and abdomen, however. One particularly large scar looped from her right hip up and over to curl across her lower back. Quinn frowned, identifying it as an old scar caused by a lightsaber strike. He doubted she was more than ten years of age when that wounding occurred.

After several more tests and scans, he was convinced Lusiel's severe headache was the result of inadequate diet, extraordinary fatigue, and, of course, stress. He prepared a dose of adequate medicine.

"My lord, this will make you sleep, because it's imperative you receive appropriate rest. I would rather you remain here in the bay in the meantime, so that I can continue monitoring you as the medicine works." Quinn gestured for Lusiel to repair her clothes, before he administered the dosage. She pulled her robe back up and over her shoulders.

"Thank you, Captain. See that I am woken in time for dinner, or Vette will nag me endlessly over skipping another meal."

"Of course, my lord."

Quinn stood there watching her until the Sith had fallen to sleep. Then he moved across the room to retrieve a blanket he used to cover her. He watched Lusiel for a few minutes more, observing her features when she was most relaxed. Her dark hair spilled unbound across her back and the surface of the table behind her, while her hands were pulled up and clasped together just under her chin. She looked … innocent, somehow. Hardly an image to coincide with that of the lightsaber-wielding bringer of death so many Balmorran rebels had met during their last moments.

Quinn shifted, feeling the tightness his groin seemed to remain whenever Lusiel was in the same room. He wondered suddenly if that would always be the case, if he would always want her as much as he did right then. Maybe the more important question was did he _want_ to always desire her so much as he did right then? He retreated from the bay, looking back at her sleeping there before ducking out through the door.

At least he knew the answer to _that_ question, Quinn thought, smiling to himself.

* * *

 

Vette woke Lusiel before dinner, bursting into the medical bay somewhat typically for the twi’lek. Lusiel sat up slowly, blinking at her. Vette harrumphed, "You just had to let him on the ship. Do you know what that captain of yours did?"

" _My_ captain?"

"Yes, my lord. Because I'm not taking responsibility for him! But seriously! He took Toovee's apron! He says he doesn't know what I'm talking about but I know he did it! My lord, it took me forever to find that apron in the market place at Kaas City, remember?"  Lusiel just stared at her. Vette groaned, "You're not going to do anything about it, are you?" Lusiel slowly shook her head. Vette threw her hands up and stormed out of the bay. Lusiel climbed from the table, readjusting her robe and chuckling to herself.

She felt refreshed, even renewed. The pounding pain in her temples had not only receded but was gone entirely, with no lingering twinges or pressures to contend with. For Lusiel, the utter absence of her former distress was almost overwhelming. She had, in fact, become accustomed to the pain as a lingering constancy, even as she fought and hewn her way through challenge after challenge on Dromund Kaas and Balmorra. Feeling so much better all of a sudden was sublime.

Oh, poor Quinn. He would never get away from her after this. In fact, she may just take him everywhere with her. Always. Wouldn't that be nice? Lusiel almost danced from the bay. She dressed herself in her quarters, donning a burgundy-colored tunic and black trousers, before heading to the mess. Vette was right. Toovee's standard metal frame was uncovered by any sort of apron as he settled a plate of food in front of her. What's more, the food was delicious. A tempting dish of some sort of poultry baked into a pie shell with a flaky crust that oozed thick yellow gravy. Lusiel ate every speck of food on her plate and then had Toovee bring her another serving. By the time she left the mess in search of her ship's new captain, Lusiel was feeling utterly content.

Quinn was working on the bridge, which Lusiel thought somewhat amusing, given the hour. Vette had retreated in sullen silence to her quarters earlier. But Quinn was still tapping and ticking at the consoles in front of him, referring every so often to a datapad he carried in his right hand. She thought him particularly fetching as she stood there, watching him. It helped that he was still in uniform. She really did like the look of a man in uniform, Lusiel thought, sighing loudly just to gain his attention.

Quinn finally noticed her, looking over to find her perched in the doorway to the bridge. He came to some sort of attention, standing abruptly to face her. Lusiel moved further into the room.  "My lord, I have settled into my quarters and fully acquainted myself with the ship. I am at your disposal." Quinn recited the words like they were a report. Lusiel was amused, of course. But her standard game didn't seem applicable, here. Perhaps she should accept this new game for what it was, she thought. She would call it "provoking Malavai Quinn into removing HIS uniform top" for now.

"I should probably inspect those quarters, captain," Lusiel replied huskily.

"You'll find them spotless and in order, my lord," Quinn responded. She smiled. The tone of his voice indicated he liked her teasing, even if he didn't necessarily address it. He continued, "You'll also find I am fully trained in all aspects of operating this vessel. I can both navigate and pilot."

Lusiel shifted her weight, thrusting her hip out at a curved angle while placing her hands smoothly at either side of her waist. Quinn's gaze darkened. "If you're half as good at evading obstacles as you are my advances, then my ship is in good hands."

Quinn nodded. "I'm here to do a job, my lord."

Oh, this was going to be so much fun.


	13. On the Promenade

Lusiel wasn't where he'd left her when he followed her directions and visited one of the vendors in the Lower Promenade of Nar Shaddaa about restocking the ship's supply of bandages. He was feeling particularly proud of having negotiated the Arconan manning the medicinal supply stores into dropping his price to nearly half what he originally asked. But when he returned to the counter displaying various articles of sundry purpose Lusiel had been poking through, she was gone.

Quinn frowned. The Promenade was a busy space, complete with garish blinking lights, sultry twi’lek voices that promised every possible pleasure booming from countless speakers, and dangerous characters of every species and inclination everywhere. But the Sith he himself was supposed to accompany and protect was nowhere to be seen. Quinn was determined to find her, before something bad happened to her. Or, rather, before _she_ did something bad to someone else, he thought, as he watched a pair of obviously Republic troopers walking steadily along the Promenade walkway. One of them was a Cathar, he noted.

This was not Imperial space and a Sith could find herself in serious trouble if she acted against Hutt interests, here. The Hutts insisted on neutral relations between the Republic and the Empire at Nar Shaddaa. At least, in the open. He knew, as everyone did, the two factions continued their battles in the city planet's lower levels.

Quinn was determined to locate Lusiel. He ducked around the vendor booth, scanning the alcoves up and down the walkway. He was about to refer to his commlink when he suddenly heard Lusiel's voice coming from behind him.

"Quinn. I don't think the vendors are hawking any wares back there."

The Imperial officer spun around, to find Lusiel standing, once again, right in front of the booth where she'd originally perched herself. But how … "Oh, come on, Quinn. I'm Sith. We're supposed to keep you on your toes. I managed to find some items I'd like you to look at, anyway. Let's go." Lusiel's lips continued twitching as he followed her.

Quinn said, "My lord, I successfully resupplied the medical bay with bandages. The goods should be delivered within the hour. I've already informed Vette to expect the transport."

"Of course." Lusiel came to a stop in front of a booth selling bits and pieces of armor and weapons. Quinn watched her, steadily, noticing the glimmer of the lights against her pale skin made her appear to be glistening. Lusiel spent several moments glancing through the wares the vendor was offering, before finally waving him over to her.

"Here, Quinn. I think this blaster is far improved over the one you're carrying now. It even offers the chance for additional upgrades over time. What do you think?" Lusiel glanced expectantly towards her captain.  Quinn blinked, then bent over the item in question with an appraising eye, recognizing the thing as a remarkable piece. As Lusiel indicated it could be upgraded. The price, however, was beyond what he himself could afford.

"What's wrong?" Lusiel asked.

"It's a very good blaster, my lord. But I am afraid I lack the resources needed to obtain it."

"But I don't."

"I can't ask you to …"

"You're not. I'm only ensuring my crew members have the best possible tools with which to perform when in my service."

Quinn nodded, fully supporting the Sith's logic. Lusiel gestured towards the vendor, a Gran this time, with his three eyes on their protruding stalks quivering in their direction. She bartered quite happily for the next few minutes until the sale was complete, and then Lusiel handed the blaster wrapped in a brown cloth to Quinn himself. His old blaster went into the hands of the same Gran who'd sold them the new piece, with Lusiel pocketing the pitiful credits the thing was worth.

"Here, Quinn. I saw this, too, and thought you'd like it." Lusiel blithely offered him a star-shaped crystal, a data storage device that, he saw, provided a series of Imperial history notations. Quinn was pleased, although he recognized Lusiel's attempt to obscure her wish that he like the obvious gift.

"Thank you, my lord. I'm honored."

Lusiel nodded at him. But he sensed her satisfaction. He followed her up the ramp towards the taxi leading from the Upper Promenade.

* * *

 

Lusiel emerged from the Promenade into the open air of Nar Shaddaa, shuddering somewhat delicately as she considered the terrible stench that permeated everything and everywhere on the city planet. Between that and the god-awful attitudes of every being she came into contact with, here, she was ready to concede Baras was correct, that Nar Shaddaa was the armpit of the galaxy. And learning there was anything at all she agreed with Baras about added to her overall discontent, too. She couldn't wait to be done with this place.

Quinn was walking just to the right and behind her, a steady presence. She'd felt sorry watching his frantic effort to find her earlier. But her meeting had taken longer than she initially planned, too. That, or Quinn simply concluded his business faster than she had anticipated. Probably the latter, now that she thought on it. Lusiel hoped the gift she gave him soothed any wondering he had about where she'd disappeared to, that he assumed she'd only been looking for a pretty bauble to give him. Some things would simply have to remain secret from her handsome-captain-who-spied-on-her. It was too bad, really.

At least her contact with Kir Rifet, a Nautalon she'd long since tasked with various business and communication efforts she wished concealed from the wider Sith community, had proved successful enough. The datapad containing a note from her old overseer, Tremmel, was burning a hole in the pouch attached to her belt. No names, of course. His mere survival was a carefully orchestrated masquerade Lusiel was determined to maintain. But she'd discovered he received the funds she somehow managed to secret off Balmorra, so that he could obtain upgraded cybernetic implants that replaced the hand she took from him. He'd been struggling with an inferior piece of prosthetic trash until then. The man who'd taken endless hours to train her in the rhythms of lightsaber battle, teaching her how to make her blade sing, had lost everything in one foul moment and only because of the egotistical manipulations of one bastard. _Damn you, Baras_ , she scowled.

Baras' insistence she kill Tremel had enraged her, as she stood there in front of him during their first meeting. She'd almost quivered with it, tried at first to hide it.  Then, sensing the impossibility of keeping Baras from knowing how unhappy she was, just bared it to him in full.  Like a feline tigress snarling and swiping at him when pressed too far.

That he thought to box her in, control her so much as that, by forcing her into such an "either or" trial – it was maddening to Lusiel. There was nothing she despaired of more than to feel she was constrained in some way, tied and bound to anyone's purpose aside from her own. To lack control was to have others abuse you utterly, Lusiel believed, and she refused to ever grant anyone, most especially a Sith, such utter control over her. She would not be tied, not be held down and touched.  Not ever, and not by anyone.

Only one Sith had ever truly tried and she bore the scar on her hip that resulted from that effort. Even her tender years of eight didn't save him. She'd left chunks of him lying scattered about the room he'd dragged her into, her rage was so intense. But the experience of being held down, unable to move, or even call out had been horrifying. She would not tolerate anything like it ever again.

So Lusiel proved that Baras didn't control her. She saved Tremel, secreting him off and away from Korriban with her brother’s help, towards some distant world she herself remained safely unaware of. The only piece of Tremel Baras ever got was that damn hand. He didn't even keep the ring, just tossed it towards her and taunted her with the longstanding rapport she'd enjoyed with the overseer. She was rather surprised he didn't laugh when she was forced to kill Tremel's daughter a short while later. Fool girl attacked her. Tremel, at least, expressed understanding about that particular confrontation. None of it mattered. Baras was still an ass.

Enough musing, though. Time to introduce herself to Halidrell Setsyn. And hope the slave trader wasn't overly fond of her pig of a master.


	14. Wagering against the Exchange and the Cartel on Nar Shaddaa

Halidrell Setsyn conducted her business in a fairly well established neighborhood. And why not, the Hutts encouraged the slave trade. Lusiel herself had no real concern either way. She certainly wouldn't hinder the buying and selling of any slave, only worked to ensure anyone so indebted to her as a slave was properly cared for, as the weakest were supposed to be by the strongest.

But Halidrell was occupied when Lusiel arrived, fending off some pushy thugs from some group called "The Exchange" that was apparently intent on needling the woman for a cut of her business. As if Darth Baras would ever allow whatever profits he enjoyed from supporting Halidrell's trade here on Nar Shaddaa to go elsewhere. Laughable thought, that. Although better Baras never realize they were trying. He might end up asking her to destroy the entire organization. And she wanted to leave Nar Shaddaa as soon as possible.

"Take one step closer and there will be two dozen Sith surrounding you," Halidrell crooned at the thug leader. Lusiel subtly rolled her shoulders as she paused in the doorway, tossing Quinn a quick glance and accepting his nod in response. _Wonderful_ , she thought. _Let the fun commence_.

The thug was laughing as she walked up behind the group, "Two dozen? That's a dead giveaway, darlin'. You got none." How perfectly amusing. Lusiel really did have to bite her lip, other than harumphing. She watched the man's beady eyes widen as he caught sight of her.

"One is all she's going to need," Lusiel told him.

"See, I told you so.  Not so smug are you now, huh," Halidrell taunted the thug.

"So you really do got a Sith up your sleeve. Well…we've been trained to take out Sith. Time to flex our muscles," he replied. Lusiel caught sight of Quinn's scowling countenance as he widened his stance in preparation.

"This is quite ridiculous," Lusiel addressed the fool thug.

But the man was just too stupid to be afraid.  "Kill the Sith," the leader said, turning his head to address the idiot standing behind him. Idiot, because they were all still standing there.

Of course, the leader caught sight of Quinn when he turned, too. Quinn was shaking his head in disapproval, scowling at the lot of them as he yanked his sparkling new blaster free and started shooting. "Kill the Sith," indeed. The thug started to give out a shout but it was too late. Halidrell dove for cover behind the counter as Lusiel's lightsaber flared red and arched in sweet melody across the man's busy throat. His head flew … somewhere. Another one of the thugs fell down, screaming, as a blaster bolt hit him in the lower back. The still singing lightsaber soothed his incredible pain as Lusiel flowed forward and around. Her last swing merrily twanged against the final man's abdomen. He screamed out and fell over, gasping. Quinn approached close enough to put one last blaster bolt in that poor fool’s face.

Quinn turned to regard Lusiel carefully, his gaze moving up and down her form in methodical and precise routine, quickly evaluating her for any sort of injury. He smiled when he observed little more than sweat dotting her upper lip. Such a beautiful female, he thought.

"You have a flair for dramatic entrances," Halidrell popped her head back up from behind the counter.  She was not smiling at them as she surveyed the mess in her business. "You're the apprentice Darth Baras prepped for me, right?"  Lusiel listened as Halidrell described her task on the planet, the search for Baras' agent, Dellecon, who'd stupidly taken shelter with a man Baras despised thoroughly, the somewhat youngish Lord called Rathari. Apparently he'd impressed particular members of the Dark Council because Rathari had been granted enormous leeway on Nar Shaddaa. But Rathari's support of Baras' erstwhile spy-turned-potential-dead-man served to paint an equally bright, shining target on himself. Unfortunate, that, because Lusiel found Rathari’s direct approach to matters somewhat appealing. That, or she just despised Baras enough to like the very different Rathari for being so different.

Not that it mattered, Lusiel considered, as she walked out of Halidrell's shop. Regardless of Lusiel's feelings, Rathari was doomed so long as Dellecon hid behind him. He'd failed to appreciate one of Tremel's best rules. The one that said, "When a thing is used up, it must be eradicated." Rathari was trying to cling to Baras' trash, and it would only work to ruin him in the end.

"Quinn, tell me the best means of addressing the Hutt cartel," she insisted. Tucking his head closer to hers, Quinn proceeded to describe the political machinations of the Hutts, Lusiel listening very carefully. It wasn't the most engaging conversation. Talking about slimy Hutts just wasn't overly appealing.  But the subtle scent of what Lusiel assumed was Quinn's shaving cream mixed with the smell she associated with him alone, a rather woodsy, natural aroma, drifted in Lusiel's direction. She could almost ignore the fact they were still in Nar Shaddaa as they leaned close together there in the transport.

* * *

 

Lusiel ignored the smell randomly expelled by the two gargantuan Hutts lounging in the corner of the room. Apparently Nar Shadda was, in fact, utterly permeated with the constantly reeking gas of Hutt flatulence. The travel advisories failed to mention that little fact.  How the Zabrack man chanting for the Hutts’ attentions, insisting with them, even managed to stand so close to the creatures was mind-boggling.

The Zabrack was arguing with the Hutts right then, "You would be wise to bend to the great Lord Rathari's will. Sign over the specified territories before he loses his patience." Lusiel crossed her arms across her chest as the Zabrack, his bright red and black skin gleaming in the pale yellow light illuminating the scene, paced back and forth in front of the Hutts. She wondered if the territories the Hutts were being compelled to give over to Rathari's control stank as much as their current environs did. Probably, she surmised.

"It seems we have no other choice," whined one of the Hutts.

Lucky for her, Lusiel thought. Because the Zabrack didn't have a Quinn. _"My lord, Hutts are renowned for their ruthless acquisition of power and wealth. They vie as much with each other as they do outsiders. They'll be quick to betray their fellow Hutts in an effort to obtain even the smallest benefit or, more likely, to save themselves from threat. Don't fool yourself, either. They may look encumbered by their large weight. But they make up for it by surrounding themselves with formidable defenses. Appeal to their innate greed and ruthlessness, rather. Oh, and their egos. They're incredibly arrogant."_

Lusiel took in a large breath. Through her mouth, of course. " _I_ am your other choice," she interposed. Lusiel was gratified when Rathari’s Zabrack agent, the one called Gilrik, proceeded to introduce her to the Hutts. Well, stomping his feet in her direction as he demanded the Hutts remove her, rather.  Regardless, the entire angry tirade he spewed in her direction did help to move matters along. She was even able to insult him in turn, even if calling him a worm failed utterly to get any insight into Rathari's location.

But the Hutts seemed rather excited to see the two Sith apprentices veritably circling each other there in the center of the room.  "Oh hoho. Another Sith suitor appears. Tell us your purpose, dark one," one of the Hutts chuckled at her hard enough his big belly shook like something obscene and gross.

"I have no quarrel with you. But Rathari must die. Although as I consider the thing, destroying him will also relieve the Cartel of his endless intrusions.  Perhaps that might please you," Lusiel responded.

"We have seen Rathari's strength firsthand. We know nothing of yours. Fight Gilrik. If you win over him, we will set aside our treaty with Rathari." The Hutts charmed her as they proceeded to lay odds with each other over the impending fight. If it wasn't for their gassiness, she'd even call both the Hutts rather cute slugs and even witty purveyors of recreation and entertainment worthy of her attention. But, alas …

The red-faced Zabrack came at her then in some wild rush. Hardly a surprise, knowing that Rathari instructed his apprentices in the value of bold brashness. But she had learned to lose herself in the song of the lightsaber until it flowed all around her, learned to let her song consume her enemies in her blade’s own cool and stoic rhythm. Tremel had first approached her as she lay bleeding and torn, after she'd literally torn apart her attacker with the sheer power of her will over the Force. She was only eight years-old when he started teaching her, showing her.  And he promised she’d never be so wounded and bleeding as she was when he found her there that day in the testing field.  No, Tremel always insisted she fight even harder. He showed her how to make her blade sing!

This Zabrack was no match for her.  And she spun against and around the man’s red-skinned form, their blades clashing, trilling.  She easily and simply spun her lightsaber across his belly, and watched him fall down to one knee in front of her.  "No, this isn’t possible impossible," he gasped, clutching his abdomen through several pained gasps.

"You fought well enough," Lusiel admonished. "Quinn might repair your wounds."

"No! I will not accept … such a dis … disgrace. I die … by my own hand." Lusiel watched him impassively as the Zabrack destroyed himself using his own saber. She turned away, just as Quinn's face twisted with shock and disgust. No time for assuring him, she reminded herself.  The Hutts were already talking to each other about compensation for their wager. At least something good was had from the mess, Lusiel considered. She was only glad she never learned how much they wagered against Gilrik’s life.


	15. Ice Cream

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Lusiel chatters to Quinn about her childhood, here. But there is a huge level of deceit in the telling. Remember, Sith don't typically describe their family bonds so readily. Quinn should have known better, hehe. And there is a subtle hint in here, of possible family ties past Lusiel and her own siblings.

Lusiel stopped so suddenly Quinn nearly bumped into her. He saved himself from such utter embarrassment only because he was, awkwardly, watching the sway of her backside so closely that her abrupt halt didn't necessarily catch him by surprise. He berated himself angrily, complete with mental castigations about the flimsiness of his personal character as an Imperial officer.

"Quinn! Look over there!" Lusiel pointed in the direction of a busy vendor stall near the entrance to the spaceport. Even as Quinn watched, several more interested patrons gathered around the stall. The sign blinking above the venue read, "All the way from Coruscant, ICE CREAM – rich variety of flavors – HURRY! It melts!"

Lusiel was already moving towards the growing line outside the stall, with Quinn trailing her in puzzled silence. He soon found himself perched on a bench aside a rather perky Rhodian, his green reptilian skin rippling as he chattered to another Rhodian on his other side. But he only watched Lusiel, who sat next to him.  She devoured what appeared to be fried bread shaped into a cone shape and stuffed with some kind of soft frozen pudding she called “denta bean ice cream”.  Lusiel did offer him a serving of his own choice but Quinn refused.  He barely preferred sweet dishes and she described the treat as a dessert.

"That was good," Lusiel admitted finally, as she consumed the very last bit of ice cream and cone. "I remember having some when I was very little."

"Really, my lord? When was this?"

Lusiel pondered. "I'm not sure. It would've been before I was six, though. My father brought home servings of ice cream that had been commandeered from a smuggler vessel out of Coruscant. My brother enjoyed the beebleberry ice cream but my favorite was the denta bean."

Quinn leaned back slightly. "Your father…he was an Imperial, then?"

Lusiel stiffened, looked uncomfortable as she remembered.  Quinn wondered if she was ashamed to admit her father wasn’t Force-sensitive, knew most Sith tried claiming generations of Force ability.  But Lusiel only lifted one shoulder as she told him, "Yes, he was a medical doctor, actually. He was gone a lot of the time. He would be stationed on various ships for long months. My mother would tell me great stories about how brave he was and all the lives he saved, when I was very little. He was very much my hero. Perhaps every small girl thinks like that of her father, I don't know."  But she didn’t look at him.

"Where is he now?"

A strange look passed over Lusiel's face. "He died. When I was six."

"I'm sorry, my lord. That must have been painful for you."

Lusiel shrugged, seeming unbothered as she stood up again. "It was a long time ago. I was glad for the treat today, though. That another Imperial officer was with me as I enjoyed it has a certain irony, don't you think?"

Quinn glanced at her, startled, and then smiled. "I'm glad I could be of assistance, my lord."

"Come, I'd better get some for Vette. Perhaps she'll shut up about that damn apron."

* * *

 

Vette glared at Quinn when he entered the mess, carrying several dripping packages. She didn't say anything to him, just watched him stonily, even as droplets of something creamy steadily plopped onto the floor in front of him.

Quinn shrugged. "That apron did look absurd on the droid, Vette."

"It did not! Not that you would know, anyway. Your sense of taste is limited to three colors – gray, black and white – and only one actual style – military. Beyond that, you're hopeless," Vette ticked off her points on the fingers of one blue hand.

"I have the good taste to have requested serving on this ship, with Lord Lusiel," he retorted. "Speaking of which, she asked me to give you this. Would you take it from me? I think it's leaving sticky residue on my boots." He held out the package of ice cream carefully, ignoring Toovee's whines about the mess on the floor as the droid followed him into the mess.

Vette retrieved the ice cream and stood there, watching as Quinn marched back out of the room. "Jerk. Don't worry, Toovee," Vette patted the droid on his mechanical shoulder. "I'll get you a new apron."

* * *

 

Quinn observed the time clock nearby the console where he continued working late into the evening. The ship had been quiet for several hours as Quinn continued organizing his plans and schedules for the coming days, both Lusiel and Vette having long since retired for the night. He stopped for a moment to briefly rub his forehead, tiredly, before glancing down at the floor.

His right boot was still marked with a dried droplet of melted ice cream.

Quinn sat back in his seat, contemplating his earlier conversation with Lusiel. He proceeded to run through several computer searches for any biographical information he could discover about the Sith he was serving. He wasn't overly surprised the data was fairly obscure. Few Sith were actually willing to display details about their personal lives in any sort of open forum. Some Sith went so far as to adopt new names once they took their place among the Sith, leaving behind their families of origin entirely. So the records of Lusiel's earliest years Quinn was able to locate were few but constructive and he looked over them with tremendous interest.

He learned the names of Lusiel's parents, Lucian and Karen Phyre. He knew they'd lived in Kaas City, so that must be where Lusiel was born. Both of her parents were listed as "dead" after her sixth year. She was sent to Korriban when she was eight years old. She did have a brother, named Khyriel, who was similarly tested and found to be non-force sensitive. There was no other record describing Khyriel, so that Quinn couldn't even tell if he was, today, living or dead. It was as if he simply vanished from public purview. Quinn's military mind supplied several likely possibilities.

The only other bit of information he was able to find about Lusiel was a record from a hospital in Kaas City, describing a so-called "accident" in which Lusiel was "gravely wounded" with a lightsaber at age eight. A handwritten note at the bottom of the page read, "Bruising around inner thighs, bite marks on chest, two blood types present." She was only eight years old, he thought painfully. Quinn squeezed his eyes shut and leaned his head back against his chair.

The thought she was surely afraid during that episode simply offended every one of Quinn's sensibilities.

Quinn's commlink chirped and he retrieved the device mechanically.

"Quinn, I truly hope events on Nar Shaddaa are proceeding as planned. Is my apprentice close to destroying my agent, there?"

Quinn shook himself, determined to concentrate on the conversation. "I believe so, my lord. We have been working to disrupt Lord Rathari's ventures on Nar Shaddaa in order to flush him out into the open. And, thus, Dellecon."

"Good. Proving detrimental to anything Rathari hopes to achieve will prove intensely satisfactory to me, as well." Baras' pleasure was obvious. Quinn was gratified he was able to soothe the Sith Lord's fears in regards Lusiel's loyalty and effort. "What else, Quinn? Has my apprentice been busy with anything there on Nar Shaddaa? Has she ventured into the cantinas, at least," Baras actually chuckled.

Quinn startled at the query, as Baras had hoped. He was dreadfully defensive of the girl, Baras thought.

"No, my lord. She ate ice cream."

"Excuse me?"

"She appears to enjoy a dessert food common to Coruscant, called ice cream. She purchased several supplies of the stuff and asked me to store it on the ship. I am certain you aren't interested in such details, however, and I apologize."

"When did she become familiar with foods native to Coruscant?"

"She said her father brought her a supply of the stuff when she was a child."

"Her father?"

Quinn's entire system went on alert. He suddenly felt particularly threatened, watching as Baras seemed to lean forward into a near intimidating posture. Quinn said, "Yes, my lord. Just that her father brought her some ice cream when she was still a child and that her favorite flavor was denta bean."

"I see. Fascinating. As much that she would tell you such a thing, in fact. Good, good. Keep up the good work, Quinn. I'll contact you again before long." Baras' image faded.

Quinn cocked his head, considering. Then he returned to his console. Very deliberately and with incredible precision, Lieutenant Malavai Quinn destroyed any record describing Lusiel's original place and family that he'd managed to find. With tremendous pleasure, he gazed one last time at the words, "Gravely wounded … Bruising around the inner thighs". And he pressed delete.


	16. Making Assets

"My lord! What is the meaning of this? We are on the verge of striking a major blow to the Republic, here," General Kligton pointed angrily towards the smoking space between his line and the enemy’s, where Lusiel could only just make out the bobbing heads of some Republic troopers.  Kligton glared towards Lusiel, who rather appreciated his boldness, in fact. Lusiel disdained the constant boot-licking attitude of so many Imperials. One who faced her directly, squared off with her so bluntly – it was a novelty.

Although now that she thought on it, that's probably one of the reasons she appreciated Quinn's assured approach to their own dealings, too. She shrugged to herself. Lusiel was only ever truly attracted to those men who showed her real strength, who’s bearing and manner was as bold and certain as her own.  Quinn wasn't any sort of doormat to her power, even if he did provide a ready and willing subservience. There was a potency to Malavai Quinn that she admired, a willingness to stand up to her when warranted, an ability to declare himself even in the face of her own power.  She really did _like_ her captain.

"I am looking for Lord Rathari. If he shows himself, none of you will suffer," Lusiel waved her hand in an encompassing gesture to the gathered soldiers. She sensed Quinn's approval behind her, that she didn’t mindlessly destroy the Imperial line. She was grateful they so often agreed on how to approach such situations.

"He is attending to other matters," Kligton shrugged. Then he placed his hands on his hips. "You belong to Darth Baras, don't you? I was given instructions to destroy you if you were so foolish to appear."

Lusiel’s eyes narrowed, her mood souring fast under the man’s insulting label of her.  Belong to Darth Baras, indeed.  As if she was some mere pet, some small yipping dog that chased after the fat Darth’s coat-tails.  Well, this General Kligton sure had a knack for earning her disapproval.  And with only a few brief words, too.  The man was downright talented.

She pointed a finger at him, "If I were you and wanted my head to remain attached to my neck -- I would ignore those instructions."

"Oh, I think not. You are surrounded. And we far outnumber you. Full attack!" General Kligton shouted a quick order to his men, directing them against her. He was quick to disprove any notion she might have maintained he was something less than a fool.  Or maybe he was only overconfident of his men’s abilities, thought his own position so much superior to just one Sith.  Any Sith, really. 

He was wrong.  Lusiel responded quickly, her lightsaber flaring with its terrible song of desire, a red arc of sound that drank down one scream after another. The Imperials did use better teamwork than the rebels and Republic troops she was accustomed to fighting. But they were still no match for her blade's refrain and, one after another, they fell before her.  Like she was chafing wheat in some field, maybe.

Quinn pressed in close behind her, his blaster firing in regular clipped bursts. But then she heard him grunt in pain, and her rhythm faltered. She glanced back at him, saw him stumble slightly.  But he recovered fast, standing straight before he raised his blaster up and smoothly shot dead the soldier who had somehow managed to land a sizzling blow to Quinn's upper thigh with one well-timed shot. Lusiel snarled.  She leaped to provide a stronger presence in front of Quinn, shielding him.  Quinn quickly yanked a droid kolto probe from one of his belt pouches. The giggling whirl of the tiny machine squirting its kolto onto Quinn's leg provided a renewed tenacity to Lusiel's song and her blade blared its potent work.  Until they were all dead around her, lying there in sodden heaps.

Lusiel gazed impassively down at a very dead General Kligton.  Then she sniffed and turned to look at Quinn, frowning, "Are you all right, Quinn?"

"Yes, my lord. A minor injury. The kolto is working well and I feel no pain."  He sounded rather dazed, actually.

Lusiel only nodded at him. She gestured for him to follow her as she stepped boldly past the Imperial line in open defiance of those Republic defenses along the other side of the space.  She stood there, her clenched fists braced against her waist as she stared over at the troopers’ defenses, unafraid.  Then she strode ahead, quite nearly gliding past the shot-ridden debris that littered the walkway dividing the two lines.  Until she was well-able to hear the men, hiding behind their flimsy barricades as she came closer, all of them shouting calls to each other and wondering what was happening on the Imperial side.  And damn that Kligton! What idiot tried defying a Sith so brazenly?  It ruined any opportunity he might have had, to win out over the Republic using Imperial power and skill.  Left it to her, rather, to show them the clear value of Sith rule, its sheer power, rather.

At least these troopers she approached now proved they were smarter!  They didn’t even shoot at her!  Only argued, "After that display, Wegland, I really think we should be thinking how to get our asses away here in one fucking piece.  That one little female with a pretty light-stick managed to kill the lot of those armored bastards in simple seconds!  No, damn it!  Shut the fuck up, just sit your ass right there … want to feel useful?  Try to cover me, maybe.” Lusiel stopped just outside the barrier where the troopers were waiting, stood there with one eyebrow raised up as a single man in grime-covered armor stepped out from behind the barricade to face her.  Not over-young, older than her at least.  Seasoned, rather.  Likely understood battlefields, because he’d moved on them often enough.  But he was fit enough to fight her hard, his still red hair matted with sweat and grime from the earlier fight she'd managed to disrupt.  He held up his hands when he caught sight of her, "Sith … I’m Commander Naughlen, and I'm in charge of this defensive. I'm unarmed!"

Lusiel glanced behind him towards the line of troopers gathered there. She looked at Naughlen again, pointed behind him, "My own captain’s already taken a blow from a blaster today.  I’ll not chance anymore bolts, most especially from trembling soldiers wearing Republic colors.  I’ve no more patience, not after seeing my own bleed.”  Naughlen looked over his shoulder at the men lining the barricade with weapons raised up, shouted roughly to lower them. Several troopers clenched their jaws angrily, one of them even spit onto the floor. But they all complied.

Lusiel looked back at Naughlen.  His face was marked with thickly wet grime, something greasy.  But he was obviously smart enough, “Not keen on fighting a Sith today, believe me.  But I’m not able to give up the area, either. What're your terms, Sith?" The man seemed to almost choke the words out past his thick lips as he stood there, glaring. But he waited.

Lusiel canted her head, thoughtful. She glanced over at Quinn, noticed his blue eyes were looking glazed and confused as he looked back at her.  As if he wasn’t entirely certain where he was right then.  Too much kolto, she realized. He’d rushed the treatment and likely misjudged the dosage through the rough noise of the fight. She gathered herself, determinedly, and returned her attention to the commander.  "I’ll need you, Naughlen.  Perform when I call upon you, and I’ll refrain from hunting you down before leaving this cesspool of a world.  Do you understand me?" Lusiel narrowed her eyes as she looked at the Republic man. Quinn made a small hum behind her.  Happy enough, at least.  Because she didn’t waste them, Lusiel thought.

"Fine. Although none of us will act contrary to Republic interests, not even here on Nar Shaddaa.  But we’ll help you out, otherwise.  Here,” Naughlen pulled loose a datapad, transmitting his personal information to Quinn at her gesture.  "This is my holofrequency. Give out a call, and we’ll come.  You’ve got my word. Until we meet again, Sith." Holding his hands up, he backed away.

Lusiel watched him go. Then she spun away from the area, moving fast to return to her ship and its med bay.

* * *

 

"My lord, I assure you, the wound was only minor. For lack of a better phrase, just a flesh wound. I've been upgrading Toovee's medical programming and its assistance has proved helpful, as well. I am quite able to return to my duties." Quinn stood in front of Lusiel at rigid attention. She glanced down at his leg and murmured thoughtfully.  "Perhaps I should inspect the wound for myself," Lusiel purred, raising an eyebrow at him suggestively. She thrilled when his eyes darkened again, knew he was remembering their earlier foray into the med bay together, as well.

"I do have medical scans that indicate my wound well healed, my lord. A physical examination isn't necessary."

"But a physical examination would be more thorough, wouldn't it?"

Quinn shrugged. If his eyes didn't remain so shadowed by desire, she would think he really wasn't feeling any particular concern one way or another. She shifted, enjoying the blooming ache between her legs.  "Such an inspection would not expose anything a medical scan doesn’t show just as simply, my lord."

She clucked, looking down at his leg again. "Oh, I think there are a few things a physical inspection would expose I wouldn't find in any medical scan."

He only bowed his head at her, slightly, his lips quirking.  Lusiel would have offered him some more smirking commentary, except her commlink chirped right then. Lusiel reached for the device, motioning to Quinn that he remain there with her.  She was fast coming to rely on the captain’s assistance with any number of issues, she realized.  So they watched together as the holographic image of Halidrell Setsyn appeared.

"My lord! My base … we're under attack! The last of my men and I are holed up in the command center. But the doors are about to give."

Lusiel stiffened, not hesitating. "I'll be right there, Halidrell. Try to hold on."

"Doing the best I can. But … Shit, I got a bad feeling about this. Arghhhh! … The command center's been breached." Halidrell looked away from the holotransmission, watching something outside the transmission’s range.  She looked so sad, murmured, "Such power…"

Lusiel cursed vividly as Halidrell's image abruptly vanished. Quinn waited patiently, knowing Lusiel understood implicitly there was no way to save Halidrell. The woman was doomed. All they could hope for was that her death was easy and relatively painless.  "There will be a message. We need to retrieve it. Please gather your gear, captain." Lusiel simmered angrily, that someone of her was destroyed.

Quinn didn't hesitate. "Yes, my lord."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Please note: I am so not a fan of Nar Shaddaa. Especially since the game seems intent on sending us back to the planet over and over. Sorry if that's obvious in my rambling chapters, here.


	17. You're the One

The winds whipped rather viciously across the surface of the satellite tower, causing tendrils of Luciel's hair to rip loose from its regular coiffed bun and swipe across her face with stinging slaps. But she could still make out the Sith lord, Rathari, standing firmly in the center of the platform, his arms crossed over his wide chest. Lusiel satisfyingly noted the somewhat ragged, skinny figure standing nearby Rathari. There was Dellecon, she surmised.

"I don't see anyone else nearby, although that hardly surprises me.  The platform is open enough, aggressors might arrive without warning and quite simply." Quinn leaned closer to her only slightly as he remarked, his tone quiet and careful.  Lusiel nodded. Quinn had been quick to point out the likelihood of a trap as they considered Halidrell's corpse and the message Rathari attached to it in the shop, earlier. Quinn quickly formed a plan of his own, to mitigate Rathari’s certain attack.  Lusiel was ready.

"Stay alert, gentlemen," Lusiel said.  Commander Naughlen was most likely grumbling nearby, hunkered with his soldiers as he listened over the open commlink Quinn was carrying.  The Republic men would leap onto the platform as soon as she gave the proper signal, willing at least to fight a Sith she pointed them towards where they would not so simply oppose a Republic target.  Stars save them, Lusiel thought, if they failed her in the coming fight.  She really would hunt them down one by blasted one.  Lusiel squared her shoulders and stepped forward, approaching Rathari certainly, strongly.

Rathari growled his greeting rudely. "Ah, you showed. You lack your master's caution. I applaud that." Where he lacked politeness, Rathari at least noted the differences between Lusiel and Baras.  She very nearly smiled at the Sith Lord.  But then Rathari waved towards the little fellow standing next to him, "Dellacon, Baras' lackey is here. So say your piece. Before I kill her."

Lusiel shifted her attention to Baras' erstwhile agent turned target, shrugging slightly. Rathari was stalling, she knew it. Quinn was behind her, tense and prepared.  Lusiel could almost see him in her mind’s eye, scanning their surroundings with steady precision.  Wherever Rathari squirreled his minions, they wouldn’t escape Quinn’s notice for long.  Lusiel was satisfied. Her captain was _good_ at what he did.

Her pleasure over Quinn’s performance gave her patience enough to endure Dellacon’s dissembling monologue. She even feigned an appropriate level of interest, even if the little rat-faced man utterly disgusted her.  He was no Rylon, who faced his death with chin lifted up and defiant.  Lusiel even offered Rylon an honorable fight.  But this one?  Dellacon would be lucky she didn’t take each limb of his, one by one, before finally tossing him over the railing of this outrageous meeting place.  That slaver female, Hallidrel, was more worthy than _this_ sap. "Baras is insane and paranoid. I was a faithful servant and my cover was intact. Did he expect me to accept being murdered for reassurance? Just wait for death?" Dellacon stopped, eyeing her.

Lusiel sighed. She was supposed to respond, apparently.  "You knew the risks of the job when you took it."

"And how to avoid them. Lord Rathari protects me now and all of Baras' secrets will be his."

You fool, Lusiel thought, disgusted. But at least he shut up just then. Because Rathari's threats were far more interesting, at least where Lusiel was concerned. Rathari pointed a finger at her, "In a hundred years, when I am legendary among the Sith, your and Baras' death at my hands will not even be a footnote." Yes, Rathari made for a far more engaging opponent. "However, I would never lower myself to duel a mere apprentice such as you. You haven't earned the honor."

Lusiel shrugged, “I’m hardly surprised.  I was counting you a coward even before approaching this measly platform."

"Think you’re able to goad me into giving you a fight, youngling?  I’ve fought many times over, many more Sith than you can imagine."  Rathari smiled tightly, gesturing to his side.  Soldiers marked with Imperial colors appeared from around the vehicles and crates stored there on the platform, their weapons raised up and ready.  Behind her, Quinn sniffed delicately, unconcerned.  Lusiel smiled slowly, knowing he had already marked the soldiers in their little hidey-holes.  She shifted from the steady pulse of pleasure she felt right then, the arousal settling in her belly. Every proof of Quinn's skill excited her even more.  Rathari frowned at her warningly, "These men are my elite guard, trained to kill Sith. Half of them might have accomplished it today.  But I couldn’t imagine playing favorites."

Lusiel chuckled and motioned to Quinn without looking at him.  She told Rathari, "Your men may be a bit busy with mine.”  Behind her, there was a click as Quinn signaled the Republic soldiers waiting nearby.  The troopers jetted up onto the platform, surrounding the entire group with their own rifles held up in firm and ready hands.  Only their bright Republic uniforms really ruined the beauty of the motion.  Oh, well.

Rathari snarled.  He wasted no time slinging himself at Lusiel with his purple-bladed saber flashing in wild trilling motion.  Dellacon tumbled to the floor behind him, literally squealing like some absurd Gamorean freak.  Lusiel skirted herself in front of Quinn, rather, boldly meeting Rathari’s rush as her captain stepped backwards to better direct the troopers in their fight.  Lusiel’s feet were planted firmly as Rathari struck at her, and the furious tone of her blade interposing itself between them screamed through the air.  The clamor of blaster shots rose up, too, like a wild music accompanying the hiss and crackle of the lightsaber battle.

Lusiel and Rathari danced together across the platform, their sabers twisting in the sweetest of rhythms, meeting again and again with steady, resonating claps and pings. They flowed, like two rivers might flow around each other, each seeking dominance, each determined their own song would rise above the other and carry the day.

Quinn watched the two Sith battle each other with a sort of awed reverence. He rushed towards Dellacon suddenly, placed one booted foot squarely on the man's back and held him in place.  He ignored the idiot’s insistent whines to let him up from his ignoble position, shouted down at him, "Shut up." He finally swiped a blow to the back of the man's head with his blaster and listened to the very satisfying thunk of sound his skull made. Dellacon started crying. Quinn sighed, shifting slowly as he sensed Naughlen approaching him from behind.  He waited tensely to see if the Republic commander would turn the fight against Lusiel, as easily as they’d downed the Imperials.  But instead the man stood next to him, watching the clash between the two Sith.

Lusiel was magnificent. Her hips swung in smooth concert with both her firmly planted boots, allowing her to flow in synchronized motions towards and then suddenly around her opponent, keeping him constantly off-balance. The larger Rathari became quickly agitated, trying to force his greater size against her. But she continuously danced just outside his reach and her own saber struck against his armor repeatedly. She was wearing the man down, the struggle hardly seeming to upset her.  Such a melody of motion, in one curved female form that made Quinn burn.  Every time, he thought.  He couldn’t help but burn every time he saw her in battle.

Next to him, Naughlen breathed out. "That’s … fucking beautiful."  Quinn scowled, feeling suddenly possessive. But he shook himself. Better these Republic troopers were impressed with the glory of the Sith. It would undermine any opposition they hoped to pose to the Empire later on. Let them see what they'd face if they tried. But he still hated the drooling expression on the bastard's face.

He kicked Dellacon again. Just to make sure the man stayed put, of course.

There was a final, incredible clap of sound.  Just one more vivid song from the lightsabers ringing against each other, and Rathari cried out. Both Sith paused, lightsabers held upright and silent. Then Rathari backed up and carefully lowered his weapon, before dropping down to one knee. He looked up at Lusiel, dazed.  "Such power!  I’ve never seen its like.  Never before … I’ll please … I mean.  Allow me to demonstrate my service to your will.  Right now," he vowed.  Lusiel dragged in a breath, lifted her chin in a single, solid nod. Rathari stepped towards Dellacon, waited for Quinn’s step back as the little traitor whimpered piteously beneath his foot.  It was Rathari’s blade that slashed out against Dellacon’s chest, though, and the gurgle of Dellacon’s last whimper disappeared under the lightsaber’s whisper.

Rathari turned his face towards Lusiel, seeming hesitant and uncertain.  “Dellacon might have been used against Baras.  But I suspect you’ll be a far better match against that bastard’s power than Dellacon ever was.  You beat me easily enough, at least.  Please … give me the chance, just to see you when you finally destroy that fat spider.”  Rathari lowered his head, deferential and awed.  Lusiel blinked.

Lusiel shrugged. "Don’t imagine for a moment, that I would so easily betray my master."

"You will not have to betray him, though.  That man will force you into defending yourself, rather.  And your boldness is superior, there’s no match.  I’m certain of it!  No, my lord,” Rathari waved one of his strong warrior’s hands through the air. “When the time comes, only let me witness that battle.  Please.”

Lusiel stiffened. She reached out through the force for Quinn, felt him jolt. She glared at Rathari through narrowed eyes, "I have no idea what you're talking about. I am loyal, above all else.  You insult me.” Rathari's eyes glinted with understanding, but he deliberately refrained from looking away from Lusiel.

"I was mistaken, then. Please forgive me. By your leave, I will withdraw." Rathari held his hands outright, palms raised up. "The day is yours. _My_ lord." Lusiel gave him a feigned look of boredom, shrugging. She very purposefully turned her attention to the troopers who remained gathered around near Quinn, in fact. She never saw where Rathari disappeared to.

Commander Naughlen didn't smile at Lusiel. "All right, Sith. Now there's no one left but you and me and my men. Your objective's been met. May we go?" Quinn stepped up behind Lusiel once again, watching. Even he could sense the troopers were tense, unsure they'd survive the next few minutes. But Lusiel only nodded.

"Of course.  You've served me well."  She smiled slowly as the troopers moved away.  They didn’t stumble over themselves, at least.  But their gladness at being done and able to leave in one piece was quite obvious to her.  Quinn watched them impassively enough, too.

He glanced at Lusiel. "You might have destroyed them."

"Yes. But there was no need. They'll not tell anyone of what transpired here, from shame of their own participation in our support. It's really rather funny to think about, don’t you think?" Lusiel grinned at Quinn. He just shook his head, smiling.


	18. The Star of Kala'uun

Lusiel stumbled when the Nautolan shouldered her, hard.  Falling against her, like he couldn’t quite seem to keep his big lumpy feet on the proper line of the floor.  Then he gasped loudly, raising his hands defensively in front of him as he gibbered excuses. "Oh my! A Sith! Oh no! So sorry, my lord. Sorry! I wasn't watching where I was going! I'm so stupid, unworthy of your attention. Totally unworthy! Please, please forgive me. Please!"

Vette laughed at him, "Go on, beat it! No reason to make an even bigger ass of yourself, is there?" Vette watched the alien rushing his absurd way down the Promenade, like he was afraid Lusiel might nab one of the tendrils hanging down from the back of his head as a souvenir.  She snorted, "What a loser. Come on, my lord. The old gang will be waiting to take the Star of Kala'uun. We have to hurry!"

Lusiel nodded indulgently at the bouncing twi’lek, grateful to her for the easy distraction. She only tossed a glance towards the Nautolan’s dwindling figure, as he hurried away. Kir Rifet had smoothly extracted the datapad loaded with her communications during the brief exchange.  His impressive sleight of hand -- not even Vette managed to catch sight of him taking the datapad – meant that her directions in regards her own people, the ones she didn’t want Baras noticing, that those people knew her thoughts and intentions.  Vette’s sheer bubbliness just helped to misdirect her master’s attention.  And her excitement, all blue and shining -- that was rather engaging, too.  Even if it did keep Vette from noticing anything else happening around her in the meantime.

Lusiel was pleased enough by the entire circumstance, at least.  An amusing adventure, at least.  Retrieving Vette’s little Star of Kala'uun allowed them to meet Cada Bliss, for one.  Vette’s speech to the man, all of it so obviously practiced and rote, had the man’s big Duros head nearly exploding with frustration that he couldn’t divert them.  Of course, Lusiel was simply glad to meet the man who’d sent Vette off to Korriban in the first place.  Although the easy threat and risk to Vette herself, the easy disregard of Vette’s value by the Duros … that Lusiel didn’t forgive so easily.  It became rather simple a matter, to squash the man’s fat head under her heel, then.  Well, swiping him dead with her lightsaber, at least.  The entire dance across the floor outside Bliss’ ship, with both his guards and then Bliss himself, was all of it entertaining enough she managed to forgo her own angst over still being on Nar Shaddaa.

Lusiel turned around to stalk towards the Slippery Slope cantina again, as if the Nautolan’s stumbling foray never happened. Vette fell in beside her, babbling about the myths surrounding the artifact they had taken from Cada Bliss. Lusiel barely noticed Vette’s rambling details, most of her thoughts focused still on the datapad Rifet carried off.

She had insisted Rathari leave Nar Shaddaa only after he staged his own death. His enemies would descend on him once his defeat on top of the satellite tower became better known.  And there was no way it would not, not so long as Republic troopers went along to boast and brag of their victory over Rathari’s soldiers, there.  No, Rathari needed to be dead enough no one came looking for him.  Then he could retreat to some hidden location, where Lusiel might demand more from him.  She even gave him a healthy number of funds for him to hide away.  And Tremel, too.  Her old teacher could not remain on Nar Shaddaa, now.  His cybernetics were better treated, at least, and he was intent on leaving the world quickly.  He carried word to her brother as he went along the way, messages and requests for information only someone in Imperial Intelligence might provide her.  All of it on one sweet little datapad, no less.

Lusiel suffered no misunderstandings, though.  Vette’s small sideways adventure was a valuable excuse to leave the ship without Quinn’s attractive presence and attention.  But the notion her captain would not monitor every motion she made – even as she wondered where Quinn had tucked his tracking devices on her armors and weapons, maybe – well, it was plainly absurd to think Quinn might not keep a close eye on the both of them.  So Rifet stumbled and fell practically onto her and Vette laughed up a silly storm of bubbly excitement, and no one really knew any better.

Lusiel went back to wondering where Quinn's bugs were located. She rather hoped Quinn had manhandled her underwear, in fact.  The very idea of his fingers buried in her knickers drawer tantalized her for several long moments.  Except she couldn’t really see him actually doing such a thing, not given his over fastidious nature.  The sheer intimacy of the effort would most likely offend his sensibilities.  No, he had probably put the devices on some bits of her armor.  Her commlink might be taken or snatched, after all.  But her boots and breastplate would be far harder to remove.

Not that Lusiel was offended by anything of Quinn’s actions.  In this, her captain was purely protective, and it didn’t matter how Baras might regard it.  It only mattered what Quinn intended and his focus was on keeping her safely in his noticed ability to respond to any possible threat offered to her.  Cada Bliss would never have been allowed a single step outside that hangar bay, not once his guards opened fire and Bliss himself swung a damn blade at her.  She imagined Quinn would have keenly and methodically demolished the Duros piece by sorry piece if he had managed to somehow escape the reach of Lusiel’s lightsaber. Her Quinn was gloriously protective. That amused her, too, by the by. As if a Sith was incapable of defending herself. He perhaps had little notion of Lusiel’s standard maneuvers on Korriban, how many times she had succeeded over her own fellows’ desperate strikes against her.  But Lusiel enjoyed Quinn’s protectiveness, all the same. She was female enough to find this particular aspect of Quinn’s character quite as appealing as his fit and attractive frame. She highly doubted she would be so particularly attracted to a man incapable or unwilling to defend her, anyway. So she accepted Quinn's monitoring and smoothly ensured Baras continued to know only as much as she herself chose, too.

Vette continued chattering. "Hey, when's the last time it was just you and me, huh? You need to get away from Mr. Stick in the Mud far more often, my lord. Maybe the Slippery Slope will have some of those yummy drinks you liked so much back at Balmorra."

"Oh, but Quinn has his uses, Vette."

"Yea, like stealing my property when I'm not looking."

"Please, not the apron thing again."

"Whatever. I'm just saying you shouldn't be stuck with him all the time. Ever since he came on board, it's been all rules and more rules. It's enough to drive me insane." Vette sighed, overly dramatic.

"But, Vette, he also provides the ship with such wonderful décor."

"Oh no, please don't start up again with how you like looking at him. Makes my head hurt just thinking about it."

Lusiel actually laughed, just as they reached the door leading into the cantina. "All right, Vette. I won't _say_ how much I like looking at him." Vette only snorted, busily scanning the interior of the cantina for several long moments. She pointed across the room.

"There they are, my lord!"

There were three twi’leks gathered together, off to the side against one of the far walls of the cantina.  Not surprising, that twi’leks would try appearing unobtrusive and out of the way.  Too many denizens of cantinas like this one might assume they were bought and paid for entertainment, easily caught and handled.  Especially since one of the twi’leks was a female, with dark-red coloring and dark rings marking her lekku.  She was an attractive figure, and the two men with her watched her carefully enough.  One of the men was bulky and well-muscled with pale mustard-yellow skin.  Bigger than his compatriot, with his slighter frame and pretty enough green skin.  Every one of the twi’leks watched the crowd with wide eyes.  Perhaps bemused over Vette’s message, that they wait there for her Sith master to attend them.  It definitely amused Lusiel herself, she thought.

Vette almost squealed as she rushed towards them. "Taunt! Guys! It's so good to see you." Vette nearly threw herself into the red twi’lek woman's embrace, and they both danced around each other in excited little circles.  But the smaller one of the men kept his eyes focused on Lusiel, rather.

"Hey, Vette. Introduce your … uh, friend, here." He gestured towards Lusiel with a green hand. Vette nodded.

"Guys, this is my …" Vette stopped, looking at Lusiel with a questioning gaze.  Lusiel waved one of her hands negligently, and Vette smiled wide. "She's my friend."

Vette’s red female friend shook her head.  "Wow, honey.  Not every day a twi’lek can claim they’re friends with a Sith. So let's get business out of the way real quick, okay? Then we'll move on to getting to know how things have been going with you since we were split up."

The twi’leks gathered into a rather colorful circle to marvel over the artifact. Lusiel ignored their fascination, just waved at a nearby attendant droid.  She was determined to enjoy her favorite fruity drink, in fact.  But then she realized there was some sort of disagreement among the aliens, with Vette shaking her head hard enough her lekku shook and trembled against her shoulders.

"No, no, guys, you keep your credits. I know you too well. You won't even be eating! You need it for weapons, bribe money – and we don't.  Need it, I mean.  Honest. Right, my lord?" Vette looked over at Lusiel.  Lusiel was by now reclining against a cushioned seat with her fruity concoction tucked close to her lips as she basked in sheer enjoyment, and she shook her head sarcastically  Vette laughed, "See, just keep the credits!" The gathering became much more celebratory at that point. Especially when Lusiel plunked credits towards the server droids for all the liquor.


	19. Playing Chess

Toovee's programming continued to confound, Quinn thought to himself as he hunched over the chess table in the ship's lounge. Not only had he proved unable to modify the droid's voice parameters but such tasks as chess continued to perplex the machine. Quinn was starting to wonder if the droid's former owners had created a loop-back mechanic of some sort into Toovee's programming that were designed to muddle anyone's attempt to reconfigure the droid for more optimal use.

Well, he thought, leaning back against the bench that ran almost half the wall in the lounge, at least it cooked better meals now. He watched sadly as Toovee blindly moved one of the chess pieces to a new square. Really, how hard was it to create a chess program for the droid that actually provided a challenge in the gameplay, he pondered.  He was so deep in thought he didn't note the step of someone coming into the lounge.

That's why she laughed at him, "Quinn, are you seriously sorry Toovee isn't beating you at chess?" Quinn looked up to find Lusiel standing in the doorway of the corridor leading towards her quarters. Her standard casual dress of a tunic and trousers hugged her sweetly curved frame. He eyed her breasts for a moment but snapped his gaze up when she noticed the direction he was looking and promptly thrust her chest out.  She smiled at him with the most sultry amusement.

_She was going to be the death of him_ , Quinn thought.

Lusiel shrugged and came over to take up a seat nearby Quinn on the bench. Together they watched Toovee consider its next move. Lusiel laughed lightly when Quinn sighed in disappointment over Toovee's ultimate selection.  "I take it this is one of those tasks you've been working yourself to all hours lately trying to overhaul," Lusiel admonished.

"Yes, my lord. Although the ship, at least, is responding well to my optimizations. We're currently operating at peak efficiency." Quinn insisted. He watched as Lusiel reached her hands above her head to stretch, her shoulders thrown back and her breasts thrust outwards. Her nipples beaded the front of her tunic. Quinn coughed, and Lusiel turned to look at him, her eyes lidded.

Her eyes always reminded him of chocolate, dark and luscious. Deeply tempting chocolate, the one sweet that Quinn adored. Quinn looked away from her.

"Oh, I've never had any doubt of your abilities, captain. By all means, keep up the good work," Lusiel murmured.

"I fully intend to, my lord."

Lusiel playfully frowned at him. "Your demeanor, however, makes me tense, captain. You could try loosening up."

Quinn straightened into proper military stiffness. Of course he did, she thought, amused. He stated, "I see. Actually, no, I don't see. Is that an order or are you testing my professionalism?"

Lusiel burst out laughing. "I get such a kick out of you, Quinn!" She laughed again when he tossed her a confused look. She smiled back at him and he shook his head, exasperated.

Toovee burbled at him, then. "It's your move, captain." Quinn started, looking back at the board. Lusiel continued watching him, still amused. Quinn and the droid continued their battle for dominance across the chess board, with Quinn triumphing quite handily of course. He was disgusted, and scowled broodingly at Toovee afterwards. The droid responded merrily, "Would you like to play again, captain?"

Quinn slumped backwards, sighing. "I will have the blasted thing play a decent game of chess eventually. It only requires an industrious approach."

"Quinn, you really do need to have some fun eventually." Lusiel chuckled.

He looked over at her, with a rather peculiar expression on his face. She regarded him steadily, trying to sense what he wanted to say. To her, he felt … perplexed. She realized he didn't know _how_ to respond. Well, _that_ was new at least. Quinn finally looked away from her, unable to express what he really thought, that since meeting her he'd definitely had more fun than he'd probably had ever before. Everything was changed, better. She had made such a tremendous difference in so short a time. He struggled, felt compelled explain it to her, even somehow.

"My lord, I wanted to explain why I was languishing on Balmorra before you arrived." Quinn began. Lusiel regarded him, nodding steadily. She sensed the discomfiture that boggled Quinn right then, made him uncharacteristically hesitant.  It was rather endearing, actually. He opted for roteness, told her with mechanical precision, "A decade ago, I served under Moff Broysc at the Battle of Druckenwell. He made a critical oversight in the course of the battle, though, that brought the fleet to the brink of destruction. So I ignored his order and turned the tide to victory."

Lusiel's eyes gleamed at him then. Oh, she had admired Quinn's strength of character, definitely his skills and intelligence. But this additional proof of Quinn's incredible resolve truly captivated her. That was the moment she _wanted_ him, knew it certainly and wholly.  As if the Force itself demanded it, that she keep him for her own and forever.  The sudden certainty was powerful enough she was very nearly overwhelmed, until she actually held her breath as the truth moved through her, in her.  She remained so still long enough Quinn frowned at her uncertainly. As if he wondered she would turn on him with ordinary disgust that he’d disobeyed.  Imperials must _never_ disobey, Quinn believed.  But he didn’t want to lose Lusiel’s regard, and the fear of it lay like a lump in his stomach as he waited. 

But Lusiel proved to him she was nothing “typical” all over again.  "Then you are to be commended," Lusiel told him, still mentally reeling.

"That's not how the Moff saw it." Quinn admitted, his expression fierce.  Doggedly determined as he thought.  Lusiel admired the ferocity of his expression, the tension that tightened his form as he sat there.  How delicious, she thought as she considered the taut stretch of his shoulders.  Quinn explained, "Broysc took credit for the reversal, which is fine. I did not act for my own regard, mind you. But then he court-martialed me, threatened me with execution. Only Darth Baras’ intervention preserved my life. I was assigned to Balmorra and the Moff has blocked every transfer, every promotion I've been up for since."

Lusiel scowled. "I have no tolerance for idiots like this Moff."  Sith or no, Lusiel had made it a concerted point to know and understand the Imperials who served her.  It was the soldiers and guards on Korriban who most often interceded in time enough to keep her from losing – losing possessions to larcenous fingers, or losing attentions to some particular lord or commander, or losing respect of her own place.  Or especially her own life’s blood.  Lusiel knew the soldiers, fought for them time and again.  Made certain they weren’t forgotten, not when they battled the beasts on Korriban or Dromund Kaas, not when every other Sith would have abandoned them to the most terrible fates. 

She once leaped between the wilting frame of a burly red-faced officer barely standing and a looming terentatek there on the red sands of Korriban, saving the man from the creature’s snapping jaws.  It was a hard, ugly fight, left her bruised and battered before it was done.  But it was _her_  training saber that stopped the beast in the end, left it screaming in the most dreadful throes as its blood gurgled and spewed out into the air, and the cheers of the Korriban troops rose up even higher.  Lusiel was only twelve years old that day, but she learned how much value there was in _earning_ her men’s loyalty, in keeping it.  As much hard as it was, too.

"I could say more about him, my lord, but my point is made." Quinn spoke firmly, his gaze steadily focused on her. He watched the play of emotions across her face and knew the most heady satisfaction that she was only just as disgusted with Broysc as he always felt.  The gorgeous anger highlighting the sharp angle of her brow over the dark candy of her eyes appealed to him, pleased him.  Desire warmed his groin into hard readiness, as usual where Lusiel as concerned. "I need you to understand, my lord.  That I serve you now. I have no regrets." Lusiel slowly blinked at him, silent and thoughtful.

Quinn cleared his throat, "I should return to my duties, my lord." Lusiel nodded. Quinn rose to his feet, bowing slightly before turning to leave. The consummate professional.  Lusiel watched him walk out of the lounge, eyed his backside with its fine turn of hips and buttocks in those damned wonderful pants Quinn wore so usually.  His uniform was forever neat, tidy and attractive as hells. She sighed to herself.

Toovee abruptly warbled at her, and Lusiel turned startled, furious eyes onto the machine. It sang loudly, "Master, are you interested in playing a game of chess?"


	20. Nightmares

_She couldn't move. Her limbs felt heavy, like something was pressed down over her, something strong and immense, and it left her unable to so much as twitch a finger. Every bit of her was stuck in place, rooted there, immovable. Her wrists were circled, lifted away, manipulated. Her body was being moved around, her nakedness now glaring in her appalled thought process. She wanted to cover herself but she couldn't move. She couldn't move and he was pushing at her, the big man in the robes was pushing at her, until her legs were held wide apart._

_The heaviness pressed on her arms, her wrists, like hands holding her down. It was inky, wrong. It wrapped itself around her and it kept changing, flowing over her arms, her legs, up and around her belly, like it was rubbing her, only the pressure was hard and cruel and it hurt her. She hurt. Then the man was there, moving over to loom atop her.  He bit her, there, on her shoulder, her side, under her tiny nipple. She tried to move, to push him away, but she couldn't. She became frustrated. If only she could raise one arm, she might be able to punch him in his big square nose. But there was nothing, no way to move._

_She suddenly wanted her da. Her father would've stopped this from happening. He was a hero, there were medals they had given him hanging in pretty boxes in his office, she'd seen them. But even more important than that, he loved her. He always brought her presents, swung her around in the air as if she was flying, and called her pretty words. But da couldn't save her. Mother hit him, and now da was gone. He was gone forever and he'd never be able to save her again._

_And she, suddenly, became very angry._

Lusiel woke with a gasping cry, her gaze darting around the room. She half expected to see the walls stained with blood and gore. But there wasn't anything there. Only the dark, grey metal of the ship's surfaces and the steady hum of space and movement as the vessel moved along. All of it was warm, secure. She was strong, capable. Her lightsaber was just there, well within reach. And … she wasn't alone. The nearby presence of her people was a balm, a blanket of comfort won through the Force sense she relied upon as much as she would smell or sight. Her companions would fight to defend her, they'd not let anyone close enough to hold her down like that again. _He_ certainly wouldn't. She had destroyed him!

Lusiel clenched her jaw, suddenly angry with herself. She was Sith! She feared no one. She needed no one. She climbed from the bed in a flurry and stood there defiantly. She almost stomped her foot, but that would've proved a level of discontent she refused to give into. No, she was too strong, her will was immense. She would show them all she was far too great a Sith than to ever be misused. She couldn't rely upon anyone else, ever. Her father didn't save her -- she saved herself.

She surrounded herself with people she could use, that's all.

Then she heard the distant twitter of Vette's singsong voice, how it rose above the steady pulsing of the ship's motion for just a moment. She heard Vette calling, "Damn you, Quinn, you namby pamby! Who the heck programs Toovee to make bran muffins for breakfast? Bran muffins, are you kidding me?! Having a rough time in the dispenser, Quinn? Or did they give you a brain transplant after that stupid organ of yours revolted?" There was a responding rumble of sound, then, and Lusiel knew Quinn was arguing with the twi’lek, even if she couldn't discern what he said.

And Lusiel laughed. Like a natural snap, like a rubber band of some kind biting her across the backside. Humor had saved her over so many years from that rigid insanity so many Sith found themselves lost within, anyway. Because losing one’s mind was the greatest weakness, the worst failure of any one, until you were little more than that gibbering fool Sith lord on Korriban who spent all his time dissecting wild Tuk’ata, as if really might discover some amazing secret digging through their entrails. A Sith who'd lost his mind was a hindrance to the absolute order the Empire deserved and depended upon, a disruption of the balance that countered the chaos of the Republic. Lusiel was absolutely determined to never be insane.

So now Lusiel's humor rushed in to recover her from the frayed remnants of her dream, to save her from falling into lonely despair.

No, Lusiel thought.  She settled back on her heels into a meditative stance, breathing rhythmically. The truth was she needed people around her. She needed to laugh and she needed to sing. She needed strength and she needed skill, verve and determination, especially in those people she kept closest to her. She needed to see these things, have these things. If they were threatened, she needed to defend them as she would defend herself. Because, in fact, they were as essential to her as any piece of her armor was. Moreso, even. Because armor could be replaced. Her people, though, were inimitable, their value beyond measure. She breathed, steadying herself.

_"I have no regrets."_ Quinn. His name slid into her drifting meditation like snow. How did she consider _him_. She knew he continued to watch her, that he spied. He felt obliged to Baras, of course. His tale last night described the reason for it. Lusiel knew that Baras had some level of coercive abilities through the force that engendered such bonds, even, although she couldn't discern yet the precise nature of the manipulation. It was most likely a unique skill Baras had long since discovered and promptly used to his best advantage, much as the Padawan's skill in seeing through to an individual's true nature, perhaps.

It didn't really matter. For now, Baras’ control over Quinn was a real thing, and breaking it to pieces was an essential thing, needful even.  Because Quinn was quickly becoming something she could not lose, something important.  Lusiel sensed his value to her, through the unique perceptions the Force itself allowed.  He could make her so much stronger a Sith, elevate her in ways she’d never imagined before.  Through him, there was a future she wanted more than anything, a security and a preparedness that would _last_.  Truth.  It trembled, shook.  The paths she needed to take, the chances at loss and failure implied throughout, but the success like a glittering thing – all of it was only just there.  Hard won, every motion and step she needed to take.  But she was winning some ground at least. Quinn's explanation the night before made it clear he was thinking beyond his role as Baras' tool, that he was looking at her, seeing her, even more and beyond whatever Baras had long offered. It would be gradual, she knew, but in time Baras' hold on Quinn would wither under the growing strength of her own. It had to. Quinn was too valuable, too incredible, than for Baras to have and use up. Lusiel _wanted_ him!

No, she had to utilize whatever means she could to take the Imperial from Baras, to deny the fat bastard such an amazing prize. Because the Darth plainly didn't deserve him. Because she herself wanted him. Lusiel smiled. She was going to take Quinn for her own. She would destroy Baras along the way. But when it was all over and Baras was lying dead at her feet she planned to have Quinn standing alongside her. He would be hers.

But for today … she wasn't eating bran muffins. No way.


	21. So close

Quinn's morning proved difficult.

The twi’lek seemed intent on disrupting his routines, the order in which he preferred to function. It was as if he closed the doors to his mental rooms only to have the small, blue twit come along and burst them wide open again, to rampage madly through whatever space his mind was occupying right then, only to leave in a huff, with Quinn’s own equilibrium completed wrecked. He’d taken to actually using those breathing exercises designed to combat stress that he taught to his youngest, most raw recruits, just to calm himself after she left him alone again.

Which is why Quinn resolutely ensconced himself on the bridge.  Although if anyone asked him, the notion he was only striving to escape Vette's overactive complaints about breakfast would not be his first assertion. Even if the bridge was the one space on the ship he expressly refused the twi’lek popular entrance. Only after she horrified him once with her maniacal taunts, "There are so many buttons in there. If I touched one, I'd have to touch them _all_. What would happen if I just went in there and started touching every … single … blinking … button." Quinn knew she was mocking him, of course.  He has seen Vette's workspace with all its sundry mechanics, all of which worked appropriately. It just didn’t matter. He knew that he needed somewhere on the ship where she couldn't appear, and that was reason enough to deny her the bridge.

He refused to admit he was hiding from the twi’lek.

So when he heard the natter of approaching footsteps coming onto the bridge he knew it was Lusiel. Quinn hoped she wasn't going to mention anything about breakfast. He couldn't refuse Lusiel's access to the bridge, anyway. Which meant if she was approaching to complain about the muffins at breakfast he would have to endure her ribbing, and he shuddered thinking of it. 

Which just amused Lusiel, too. She might have tossed out some witty commentary regarding bowel movements right then, just to needle her precious captain.  But then Quinn stood up to meet her, turning his body to face the doorway where she stopped, and he straightened into telling readiness, his eyebrow curled in query.  The way he stood there -- his blue eyes shining towards her, with the stars providing a backdrop to his form and the galaxy map highlighting his dark hair – and Lusiel practically choked on the remnants of muffin in her throat. No man should appear so beautiful as Quinn did right then. Even frowning and obviously vexed, Quinn was a stunning specimen of male human.

"Good morning, captain." Lusiel said, finally.  She opted to lean a hip against the communications console at the rear of the bridge, briefly hoping there were no messages in the thing asking for escort that her ship would need to endure.

Quinn nodded with brief deference, "My lord."

"I didn't sleep well."

"I'm sorry. Were you in need of medical assistance, my lord?"

"No, I've meditated this morning. If the issue persists, I'll inform you." Lusiel bit her lip as she assured him, watched Quinn relaxing from his concern she might tease him. Bran muffins, indeed. It was so adorably easy to get under Quinn's skin. Which is precisely why Vette persisted in pestering him.  Not that Vette thought Quinn adorable in the least. But that bothering him was just so effortless a thing. If Quinn would only react with negligent disregard, Vette wouldn't have half so much fun playing against Quinn's nerves and she would seek out some new target for her teasing. Lusiel pondered where she might find someone else Vette would happily tease as much as she did Quinn. A Jawa, perhaps. Perhaps she could have a Jawa companion on board to serve her. Someday.

"Quinn, step to the right. No, a little bit more. Thank you." Lusiel smiled at him.

Quinn frowned as he complied, obviously confused. "I don't understand, my lord."

"I like the way the galaxy map emphasizes the darkness of your hair, Quinn. Makes it look blue-black. It's quite striking."

Quinn felt himself flushing hot, the heat that washed through the skin of his face. But he stood there silent, letting the blush steal over his features and his eyes grow blue-black as he looked back at her. Lusiel lost her smile and became suddenly serious. She loved it when his eyes became dark that way. She took her hip off the console and stepped forward. Until she was just within reach of her captain. She never broke the gaze they were sharing. Lusiel lifted a hand and reached out, until her fingers brushed against Quinn's brow. He pressed his lips tightly close even as her fingers moved, running downwards along the side of his face, across his jaw, before dropping once again to her side.

Quinn couldn't stop his own hand from rising, his fingers reaching out as if he would touch her. And then an insistent mechanical chirp began peeling through the bridge. Quinn blinked while Lusiel sighed loudly and dramatically. She glared malevolently behind Quinn at the damned dinging machine with its damned interruption. But her vehemence didn't stop Quinn from stepping backwards and away from her.  Lusiel could feel the arousal still beating at him, the way it ached heatedly there in her own lower female parts, too.  But he didn’t demonstrate any of his feelings as he turned his attention to the insistent console, even if his breathing was slightly rougher than normal.  He certainly didn’t pout as Lusiel did, standing there with her arms crossed over her chest as she glared at the machine. 

Damn machine, she thought. Damn you! She considered kicking the thing. But Quinn was plucking away at the console right there in front of it.  He smiled suddenly, "My lord! My program worked. I believe our ship is being tracked."

Lusiel startled. "What? Where and by whom? Explain what you mean, captain."

"I noticed some strange signatures in the energy fields nearby the ship over the past couple of days. At first I imagined them to be indicative of space clouds or even derelict debris that maintained some kind of still-working electrical systems. But I created a program designed to track the fields, just to be certain. And it's clear, now, that the fields are, in fact, moving parallel to our own vessel. We're being followed!"

Lusiel growled softly. "I need to bring this matter to my master." She turned and left the bridge. The holoterminal blinked and whirled as they waited together. Vette came in and stood nearby the doorway into the mess, watching the proceedings with vague interest.  Baras appeared, his metallic visage staring down at them, "Apprentice, I assume there's an important reason for you to upset my schedule with this interruption."

"My ship is being tracked, master."

"Explain." Quinn provided the Sith Lord a brief description of the results of his monitoring. Baras grunted, shaking his head in response, "It’s Nomen Karr."

Lusiel grunted, disgustedly. As if there was any doubt, and why would Baras even feel the need to speak of so much obvious a thing.  Lusiel had no need to cower behind her master, no reason to beg him for the simplest answers. "Of course it’s Nomen Karr! Only an idiot wouldn’t seek to keep me in his sight, once he knew I was coming after him. This Jedi is no idiot. No, it’s only essential I confront this threat immediately, as I’m telling you now."

"Indeed. Intercept this vessel tracking you and deal with whoever is on board. Send Nomen Karr the appropriate message. I will not tolerate his continued interference in my business. I look forward to hearing of your success, apprentice."

"I have no doubt of _that_ , my lord."  Lusiel scowled as Baras' image disappeared. Stars, she despised him. But she turned, prepared to devote her attention to the immediate task at hand. She only gestured towards Quinn, trusting completely in his ability to act appropriately. He nodded back at her, bowing slightly before returning to the bridge. Lusiel squared her shoulders, centering herself. Then she strode to her quarters to pull her armor on.


	22. Lessons Learned

Captain Malavai Quinn was currently engaged in what had very quickly become perhaps his favorite pastime. It involved watching the sweet curves of Lusiel's buttocks flex and move as she cut her way through the oncoming numbers of Republic troops like they were warm butter. The incredibly splendid shrieks that met her approach, followed by the thud of bodies hitting the floor at her feet, only served to heighten Quinn's excitement. His groin remained taut and hard with arousal as he followed her through the enemy vessel.

Lusiel suddenly hissed a pained sound as some lucky bolt from a nearby trooper flew close enough to her shoulder that a brief bloody trail was left behind. Quinn watched the black line against her shoulder smoke and start to bleed, the flow spurting thuggishly, an obvious arterial nick but otherwise slight. He yanked out his handheld medicinal probe, preparing the appropriate level of drugs quickly. But Lusiel was already leaping towards the offending trooper, who's eyes widened in horror watching her fly towards him. Quinn heard the man let out a brief yelp, "Gods!" It all ended with one gurgling gasp from the man. Quinn rushed forward, calling out to her, "My lord!"

Lusiel stopped, standing steady in front of Quinn, gently swinging her lightsaber against her hip as her gaze scanned the corridor in front of them. Quinn applied the treatment to her shoulder, letting a soothing wash of cold etch its way through Lusiel’s arm.  It was a familiar sensation since Quinn had joined her, with her medicinal treatments even more effective. She hadn't added to her collection of scars even once. Quinn was too much a perfectionist for that. She looked at him now, murmuring, "Thank you, Quinn."

"Of course, my lord."  Quinn brushed her shoulder with one more swipe of his fingers, soft and careful.  He didn’t look at her, though.  As if the touch was only professional and appropriate.  Even so, Lusiel enjoyed his feelings that were so obvious to her, basked in the sense she was important to him.  Just for some small moment.

Then the Sith returned to her progress through the ship's hallways, Quinn falling in behind her with proper Imperial precision. If it wasn't for Quinn's erection, their advance might have looked mundane, unconcerned – an ordinary stroll. As it was, Lusiel was absorbed in the song of the battle, compelled forward on a course of utter destruction. Quinn's presence might have disturbed her entrancement but it was so much the opposite. Having him there added to the smoothness of her passage. To her, Quinn felt like another smooth note in the song and she thrilled to feel him there. His constant excitement, which he assumed she wasn't aware of – it only added to her own satisfaction.

Quinn _belonged_ there, just behind her. And Lusiel sang the song, her lightsaber intent.

* * *

 

The slight, skinny figure of a man hurriedly pattered at the console while two others milled alongside him in tense appraisal of his every motion.  The steady gaze of an older man regarded them from the holoterminal in front of them. "—seems to the problem, Hirosho? Tell me why you're so concerned," the holographic image calmly intoned. The now-named and utterly doomed fellow called Hirosho sputtered back at him. "Master Karr, you promised that we would remain undetected. But the ship we've been tracking for you is _here_!  How did they even find us?" Lusiel regarded the hologram, marking the features of the man she was required to destroy. Then she stepped further into the room.

"Calm your fear, Hirosho. It will not serve you. I will speak to your attacker when the time comes." _As much a fool as any Jedi_ , Lusiel thought to herself. They denied their feelings, rather than recognizing the simple truth. Feelings didn't make for anything in the individual. It's what one chooses to do with his feelings that truly frees him, rather. Because the individual is always in control, not his emotions.  That was how you won real strength and power, was in your own control.

Lusiel snorted loudly, then. "Expect the conversation to be brief, Jedi."

Hirosho spun around, his mouth falling open in shock. He sputtered when his eyes took in Lusiel's appearance, her red outer robe falling down over a dark, blackened breastplate and matching plated leg pieces. Lusiel preferred the color red, until it was dark and brilliant. It marked her, the way blood splattered her in the midst of a battle. Red was the color of life and her control over it, her own mastery.  It was also her father’s favorite color and her brother’s, too, so that her damned aunt tried leeching any sign of it from around her. Draping herself in the most crimson of fabrics was every bit an insult and castigation of that blasted woman, so Lusiel exulted in the color. 

Poor Hirosho’s agitation was certainly heightened by that wash of red and black promise, too, obviously.  He barely glanced over his shoulder at the holographic image, just stuttered, "You didn't say we were tracking a … a S-sith."  _Poor fool_ , Lusiel thought, even as Nomen Karr excused his unmitigated failure in preserving these men's lives. She absently pondered what sort of alliance he had with them, taking in the figures of Hirosho and his two compatriots somewhat critically. Any friendship he felt for the men would make the ensuing lesson far more effective.

"Please remain quiet, Hirosho." The holographic Karr addressed Lusiel directly. "Sith, I presume you are Darth Baras' new apprentice. I am Jedi Knight Nomen Karr. Do you know me?"

Lusiel almost snapped out a sarcastic response, because of course she'd never met the Jedi and when might she have been introduced to him so they could know each other, really. As if she could ever be some friend of his, she sighed. But she only concentrated on Baras’ instructions, knew there was no saving anyone on this blasted vessel. Not if she wanted to preserve her own people, and _they_ were always her priority. Now she only shrugged towards Nomen Karr, "You're the sworn enemy of my master."  Personally, Lusiel cared absolutely nothing about the disagreement between Baras and this Nomen Karr. Except that Karr's efforts to ruin Baras would work just as much to weaken the Empire as a whole and _that_ she couldn't tolerate. Had she her own way, though, she'd gladly lock the two men up in a room together and be done with the fight once and for all. Whoever emerged, she herself would destroy. Problem solved!

Instead, she was forced to play along with their silly game of one-upmanship, as each vied for ultimate success over the other. She felt like little more than a piece on Quinn's chess board, jerked back and forth at the whims of some cruel turning of fate. Wondering all the while if the one shuttling her back and forth was really only some stupid Toovee-figure, and she was doomed to fail against a superior opponent.

But this was an opportunity. To face Nomen Karr, to see him and sense him for her own self. She was no fool! This Nomen Karr was falling just as surely to the dark as any Sith delighted in. Lusiel sensed it in him, the pure pride to prove himself better, stronger than Baras, and sensed, too, it would ultimately doom him. It was a stinking sort of hypocrisy on the part of the Jedi that she despised. Even Baras was more appealing than that. He was blatantly honest in his bastard-ness, at least.

Lusiel wondered abstractedly if all Jedi were so prone to failure as this one. One little nudge… Nomen Karr kept blathering at her, of course, "Baras and I like to keep certain of each other, so when I heard he had a new apprentice I investigated. These men were merely monitoring the equipment. Following my own orders. There's no need for bloodshed, here." He even waved his hand, tried what the Jedi called reasoning with her.  Lusiel narrowed her eyes as she sensed Karr’s motions with the Force, the probing test of his power against her own.

Lusiel shook her head at him, unsmiling. Because there was no saving the men in front of her, not anymore.  Lusiel smiled tightly, "But I feel an overwhelming need for bloodshed." She gathered herself. Karr was shocked, she could tell. He held out a hand, desperate and ineffectually tried to use the Force against her. He even cried out one single, absurd warning, "Defend yourself, Hirosho! The Sith attacks!" But Karr was hardly prepared. And Lusiel was _stronger_.

The small man called Hirosho snatched up a blaster, spinning to face her. Too late. Lusiel negligently raised her hands, compelling the Force against the necks of both men standing alongside Hirosho until they rose high up into the air, their feet kicking wildly as they tried to drag air into their lungs. They hung there suspended in agony for several sorry seconds. Then Lusiel rolled her eyes, bringing her hands together in a smooth clap of sound. Above her, the two men came at each other, slamming into each other with bone-crushing force. The crunching sound of their deaths echoed through the chamber.  Behind her, Quinn winced in some sympathy as he watched the men die.

But Hirosho stood frozen, horrified at the spectacle. He certainly wasn’t paying attention enough, not to the real threat. It was the swoosh of sound that finally caught his notice, and Hirosho glanced up. He saw the Sith, appearing almost suspended in the air above him as she leaped towards him. A red glow grew brighter around him, brighter. Until he himself glowed crimson so slowly, frozen and shocked. The smash of the lightsaber against his head never even registered, not to him. Hirosho just crashed to the ground, and Lusiel smoothly rose back to her feet before returning her lightsaber to her belt.

"What an … excessive display. Those men were defenseless and unarmed." Nomen Karr actually looked sick, as if he might throw up right there on Holo for all of them to see.  He hung his head slightly and swallowed tellingly several times.

Lusiel shrugged with seeming indifference. "Perhaps it might have helped, if they’d armed themselves before trailing after my ship."

"You are Baras’ creature." Karr sighed long and low, "I shall honor Hirosho's and his men's lives by dedicating myself to thwarting the both of you."

"You can definitely try.  When you fail, you’ll know they died for nothing."

"Your confidence is unfounded and you will realize that soon enough. I find comfort in knowing you and Baras are blind to what you face."

Lusiel narrowed her eyes at him, her lips pursed. "But you don’t know what we’ve seen, what we already know, Jedi. It's why you had to sneak along after my ship, like some sad hound sniffing after a smarter target."

"I'm done with you, Sith." The Jedi offered Lusiel a cool dismissal, his image fading. Lusiel snorted. She turned smartly and proceeded to march back towards the ship's airlock.  But her captain was bothered, she could feel it as they were moving along. Her steps slowed as she frowned sideways at Quinn.

"Is something wrong, Quinn?"

Quinn shook himself, wondering what he'd done or said that exposed his disturbing thoughts. They paused as Quinn responded. "I am not certain why you killed the technicians. The men had not acted against us. They posed no threat."

"What they provided was an example, rather." Lusiel explained, "Quinn, I can't be concerned that our motions will come under the scrutiny of the damn Jedi. Given the chance, Nomen Karr will send new teams against us, to watch us. After the events in that room, however, he'll hesitate. He'll remain uncertain that any other men he sends to watch us will meet similar fates. We have some breathing room now."

"A Sith strategy. I see."

Lusiel shrugged, "My mother used to discipline me similarly. If I acted out of turn, she would inflict some punishment against my brother. I learned to take care in my actions, because their effect encompassed someone I needed to protect. It was a telling lesson." Quinn frowned as he considered her, realized he had little understanding of her familial situation.  Her brother’s records were brilliantly absent from even his own research, at least. Quinn had supposed there was some reason for the Empire to hide him, perhaps some position in the military that depended on discretion. It occurred to him now, that Lusiel was likely _still_ protecting him, though.

Quinn murmured, "My father just beat me. It seemed far more expedient, I suppose."

Lusiel eyed Quinn carefully, her eyes narrowed and angry. "Does your father still live?"

"No, my lord. Why?"

"Because, captain. I'd kill him for that."

Quinn stared after her as she stalked through the airlock.


	23. Supply Lines

Lusiel observed the smoke rising above the burning wreckage solemnly. She brushed her fingers smoothly across her forehead, just where some sweat had begun to gather, and then she began resolutely marching forward, her boots sinking into the sand beneath her feet. Quinn shuffled along behind her, only barely sliding on the sand.  He was grumbling into his communicator as Vette described some issue back at the ship.  Lucky Vette, tucked up in the ship in the so much cooler docking bay at the spaceport in Mos Ila.

Lusiel hated Tatooine. She reached that conclusion in little more than five seconds after stepping out of the spaceport into the heated oven of what passed for climate on the damn planet. She could almost choke on it, the heat was so heady. Lusiel was a native of Dromund Kaas, a jungle world. The dryness of Tatooine offended every one of her natural sensibilities. She did manage to joke to Quinn as they moved down one of the alleys of Mos Ila, "If anyone ever asks me to purchase a residence here, I plan on gutting them with my lightsaber."

Now they both approached some wrecked column of Imperial transports, and Lusiel pushed back an edge of the hood that obscured her dark head. Another gesture of protectiveness on Quinn's part. He insisted the darkness of her hair and apparel would act as a magnet for the ultraviolet radiation from the sun and actually increase her exposure to it. Without even asking, he tossed a pale robe over her normal armor and then yanked the hood up over her head. It was ugly. So was the one Quinn wore, which worked to hide his sweet form from her consideration. That’s why the robes had been added to her growing list of "things to hate about Tatooine". And never mind Lusiel respected Quinn too much to try ripping the robes off either one of them.  For now, Lusiel thought. But a sudden shout ruined what small smile crossed Lusiel’s face right then.

"Don't come any closer! We'll kill anyone who poses a risk to our soldiers! Stay back!"

Quinn shouted back at the speaker, "Stand down, soldier! You are addressing my lord, a Sith! You will bear her the proper respect!"

"A Sith? Err … well, come closer but slowly. Until I verify what you say I am bound to provide for my soldiers' protection." Lusiel waved aside Quinn's snort of disgust, approaching the shouting figure, his armor pockmarked with blaster marks. As she grew closer, with her ugly robe swinging around her legs, the man gradually lowered his rifle. "I see the armor under your robe, my lord. I'm sorry. I had to act with caution."  Lusiel nodded at the sorry-looking officer, scanning the line of soldiers lying bleeding and shattered behind the remnants of transport vehicles. Several soldiers were busily repairing the vehicles they'd deemed salvageable, hadn't even stopped when their leader started shouting. The imperativeness of their work was obvious, especially considering the wounded were so far outside Outpost Varath and distant from any medical assistance that Lusiel could see.

"Quinn, see to the wounded. Perhaps you can stabilize them." She gestured towards the bleeding soldiers, leaning against the transports or just lying haphazardly on blankets, their armors removed to expose varied injuries. Most of them still awake gazed off morosely into the air, their morale utterly defeated. Quite a few of them weren't moving at all.

"Yes, my lord, right away." Quinn hurried away from her towards the men.

Lusiel turned back to the convoy's leader, eyed his rank insignia. "Explain what happened, lieutenant. Immediately."  She listened to the man recite the day's events. The convoy was on routine patrol, transporting supplies from Mos Anek to Outpost Varath. They routinely halted at a nearby settlement along the convoy's route, mostly to recover water supplies but also to meet with the town's small community, trade with them both information and gear. Today, however, they were met with an incredible attack as they approached the settlement, heavy blaster rifle fire and even a single, large cannon. They fell back to a more defensible location.  But not before taking heavy casualties.

"What's worse, my lord, is that they're only waiting for some sort of reinforcement, else they would've reached us already. We intercepted a message they sent to another base of theirs, telling them we're sitting ducks out here and asking to meet up. By morning, we'll have the whole bloody lot coming down on our heads. We'll be wiped out, unless I can get my men out of here." He waved over towards the soldiers hurriedly yanking and pulling at wires and other parts on the highly damaged transports. "Problem is, my boys aren't going to be able to get enough vehicles up and running in time. I called for an evacuation from Outpost Varath – they're closer, my lord – but it will still take them two days to get here. We're doomed."

"Who're these miscreants who've so blatantly opposed the Imperial presence here on this blasted planet of all places?"

"Pirates, my lord. They must have taken over the settlement sometime since the last time we convoyed through here. Don't know what happened to the regular townsfolk."

"Pirates think they can get the better of the Empire's forces?"

The lieutenant pursed his lips, not saying what he was thinking. Lusiel shook her head and glanced away.  At least he kept his mouth shut, she thought.  Else he would say something aloud that proved absurdly stupid.  Something like, "Well, actually, that's what they're doing."  Absurd, because no troop of blasted pirates could truly undermine the will of a Sith.  Lusiel bent the lieutenant a slow, deadly-looking smile, “Well, we will show them the error of their ways, shall we?" The man actually blanched at the cold look of deadly intention that glowed in her eyes right then.

But the young lieutenant only nodded at her. "Of course, my lord. As you say." She knew he didn't believe her.  So she would show him, too.  Lusiel turned and headed towards her captain. Quinn was just standing up again after having moved down the line and treated what injuries he could. He stood and waited as she approached. She motioned for his report.

"My lord, two of these men will not survive the night. The others will survive if given treatment in a more sanitary environment within the next forty-eight hours."

Lusiel nodded. "They need time, Quinn. We'll go and meet these pirates at that settlement as soon as the damn suns go down. No one does this to the Empire and lives. I want that message to be very clear."

"Of course, my lord."

* * *

 

Lieutenant Markhus Avery hunkered down next to the body of his newest recruit, a youngster by the name of Dolbie. He'd been green around the ears but still happily excited to be "serving the Empire". Avery had thought, given time, the boy would grow into a fine soldier, even if his eagerness needed tempering.

Now he'd never have the chance.

Avery glanced off into the darkness, looking in the direction the Sith had gone. She'd moved off towards the settlement, her officer companion following along behind her  She told him there would be no attack coming. She also harangued the officer at Outpost Varath, via the communication uplink they'd been able to save, insisting he "move his ass" to get them their evacuation. That proved more endearing to his men, than watching her walk off over the sand dunes managed. 

Now Avery tried scanning the dark horizon with his field glasses. But the rise that separated the transport's doomed location and the settlement where they'd been attacked obscured his consideration. He was left to brood, listening to his wounded soldiers moaning.

It wasn't long, actually. Not even an hour had passed when the Imperials began hearing shouts and explosions coming from the settlement. The soldiers quieted, listening, hearing the pirates shouting wildly. Booms from the cannon sounded and were abruptly halted.  Another incredible explosion, that shook the ground under their feet, followed by several more but smaller explosions. Blaster rifles fired out in mad staccato bursts, at first wild and fierce but they gradually wound down before disappearing all-together. Things were quiet enough, then, that Avery and his men could easily hear intermittent screams of pain and panic. Crying men, so incredibly loud sometimes they could even hear the words.

"Stop, no!"

"Gods, please!"

"Don't!"

Avery remained there, huddled with his men.  They all sat quietly through the hours of the late afternoon and into the night as that small, pretty-looking Sith demonstrated the stupidity of opposing the Empire to those who thought they might rule the sands using sheerest brute force. One of Avery’s men -- Josten, he thought it was -- he finally said something that fit the men’s mood during those moments.  He growled out, "Say hello to the Sith fucking Empire, you bloody pirate bastards!"

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> My own brief reinterpretation of the heroic (+2) quest called "Supply Lines", on the Empire-side of the game, of course. I went ahead and renamed the officer who speaks to your Empire character on the planet of Tattooine. The commander of the downed Imperial patrol in-game is called Capatain Cibinel. In game, Cibinel asks your character to defeat any Exchange caravan in the area, from some sense of revenge. Once you've downed enough Exchange pirates, you can nab a spiffy reward from the officer.


	24. Who made you?

Sand people were definitely heading to the top of her list, Lusiel thought. Damn creatures screamed and whined non-stop, adding to the basic cacophony of sound on Tattooine that earned her nothing but another splitting headache. She blinked sleepily at the fire Quinn created using a device he yanked out of the camping set she discovered at one of the stalls circling the Imperial flagship’s inner circle. What was that, last week? Lusiel shrugged as she returned to watching the fire. Because it was enough she pleased her captain with such paltry presents, so she'd made it a pastime finding them. And here she sat, benefiting from their use.

Mental note. Buy Quinn more presents, Lusiel thought.

Quinn strode back into the camp, emerging from the inky blackness of the night suddenly. Like a magical creature, come to life in a blink. He stopped there at the edge of the light, eyeing her critically. Lusiel waited easily, unhurried and unconcerned. Plus she knew exactly what Quinn was about to say. He depended on a routine, in fact. She quite imagined his thoughts ran in orderly routine, even. She liked that about him, liked that she could gauge him so well, so simply. There was comfort to it all.

And then like clockwork: "My lord, you really do need to finish your meal. I can prepare a different packet if necessary."

Lusiel slanted a delighted grin at him. "Oh, Quinn. I just knew you were going to say that. What a fun game!"

"Game, my lord?" Quinn frowned, his head falling sideways in apparent thought. It wasn’t the first time he had looked at her like she was some fascinating puzzle. Lusiel liked that, too. Half the fun of her games with the man came from giving him such engaging opportunities to know her, too.

"Yes. I guess what you're going to say next -- or do, now that I think of it. And when you do, I win the game. Fun stuff."

Quinn sat down in the sand next to her. He leaned close to her, until their bodies curled together and their mutual body heat was like a warm blanket in the long nighttime coolness. Lusiel sighed happily and pressed back against Quinn, until her round breast felt plump and warm just under his ribs on his side. Quinn inhaled sharply and twisted himself, enough to softly rub his side over her.

Another step in what she’d recently dubbed Quinn’s "Tatooine Regimem" and perhaps her favorite part. She was carefully plotting how to continue that particular part of his schedule permanently and definitely long after they'd both left Tatooine. For now, she happily snuggled against his side. Like some small child tired from a day of playing along the balcony of the estate, when the rain was only slightly drizzling overhead.

Quinn remained curious, though. He idly remarked, "But I can't possibly know what you're going to guess. How then do I know if you guess correctly or incorrectly?"

"Quinn, that's absolutely absurd. Of course you can't know what I've guessed. Only I will know if I've won or not." Lusiel laughed, patting his stomach with one of her slender hands. The glide of her fingers along his tautly muscled belly sent skittering desires dancing along his spine, and she grinned as he twitched against her. Quinn only shook his head at her, still trying to grasp at the meaning of her game.

Silly man. Lusiel knew he wouldn’t be able to understand. Because there were no words that might help someone unconnected from the Force to truly know, to feel and conduct such raw power so simply. How do you explain, that absurd games of the mind were sometimes the only thing which kept your mind from drowning in the red darkness of the Force’s rage? That laughing back at it was so truly precious an effort?

A sudden racket of loud rippling cries emerged from the darkness, and Quinn reached for his ever-present datapad. He checked – and probably rechecked, too – that the alarms hadn't been triggered by any encroaching Sand People. Lusiel didn't understand why he needed to check his machines, mind you. If the alarms actually sounded, the clamor of shrieks from the Sand People would be barely bothersome up against the noise itself. Real panic should come if the more mythical ancient beasts that lurked in these sands stirred, rather. Then they’d really have an epic fight worth bragging of; not like the one they endured that first night they settled down to sleep out of doors on Tattooine.

Some sort of dog thing managed to disturb Quinn’s alarms that night, and the mad ringing had Lusiel jumping to her feet with a yell. Her lightsaber fired crimson blood bright there in the dark, brilliantly fast, and that dog-thing practically dissolved under the slash of her swinging blade. Not even two seconds worth of effort, mind you. Lusiel knew, she'd checked the time on her own datapad right afterwards.  She told Quinn, "I do _not_ appreciate being woken like that.  You should perhaps tell all of the dog-things of this world, or I'll turn every blasted one of them into red goo."  She ignored him when he pointed out that dogs tended to learn through repetition, rather. 

Now Lusiel barely moved, didn’t even yawn. She only waited, listening to the shrieks of the Sand People nearby and gauging the nearness of their sounds. They were far enough away, she finally concluded, and she returned to the more pleasant pastime of watching Quinn. Far more invigorating an exercise, than it was to think of what Sand People actually looked like. Although now that Lusiel thought of it, she realized she’d never really seen what a Sand Person looked like. They wrapped themselves in tightly bound twists of cloth and metal tubes, so it was a wonder they were even able to breathe really. Hence the tubes that stuck out from the cloth over their mouths, most likely. Utterly disgusting, she thought.

Not so much her own Quinn. The possessiveness of the thought was smoothly easy, comforting. She liked looking at him, the way the fire highlighted his high cheekbones and slanted eyes, made the blue of his gaze look darkly glittering in the low, red light. She wondered if he looked like his mother or father, all of a sudden. So she had to ask, "Quinn, do you look like your father?"

Quinn twisted his head around at the surprising question. Although looking at her and the curiosity etched over her soft, creamy features, he wondered why he would be so shocked. Lusiel was too bold, fearless and inveterate in her every step and motion. When she wanted something, she reached for it without hesitation. And it pleased him somehow that what she wanted right then was to know more of him than the starched appeal of his form and occupation. That she wanted more of him, than what he might win her, do for her.

She wanted to know him. Quinn nodded, "Yes, my lord. I look much as my father did. We have the same coloring, I have his eyes. Although he was far larger. I always imagined he'd hoped I'd be bulkier or stronger, at the very least. I was always a disappointment to him."

"Really? Why?"

She really didn't know, he thought. Lusiel only sat there regarding him with the most incredible expression of bewilderment, as if the mere notion something about him might be disappointing was beyond her briefest understanding. Quinn felt warm satisfaction settle in the pit of his stomach, even as he wondered what sort of man might have taught her to see men’s value the way that she did. It had to be her _father_ who’d guided such an understanding, he thought. It was just too innate to her character. Most Sith lost any sense of appreciation for the Imperials who served them, seeing them as little more than brief cattle or tools only barely worth life.

How had her father shown her, what had he done that made her truly _see_ the men who followed her? Quinn recalled that Lusiel’s brother was no Force sensitive, either. Many families deplored such a failing in a younger sibling, sometimes destroyed those offspring outright. Not that the practice was commonly admitted, either. Such younger children simply endured more “accidents”, rather. Or illnesses.

But Lusiel’s brother lived and served. She had known him, probably played and laughed alongside him. Quinn suddenly wondered where the man was today.  Lusiel likely knew always. She watched everyone around her so methodically, after all. Why would she lose sight of something so much a part of her as a brother? Did she value him even now, Quinn wondered. Then he wondered suddenly, whether she would value children of her own who lacked the Force.

Quinn dropped his gaze down towards Lusiel’s belly, thought what she would look like swelled with pregnancy. Plump with _his_ babe, maybe. His nostrils flared as he imagined it, imagined the wonder of it. Would she ever want something so incredible, he pondered.

Aloud, he sighed slowly, "My father wed my mother, who came from a long line of Force users, hoping she would produce a Force-powerful child for him. Instead, she died giving birth to me. And then I turned had no Force abilities of my own. He hated me for it. He said I was the biggest disappointment of his life. He punished me for the failure quite regularly."

Lusiel looked away from him, towards the glittering flames over the heating device. He could see her mind moving, memories scattered through her brown eyes. “Better that he’s already dead, then. Your mother, though. She was Force powerful?"

Quinn nodded. "She was never a very powerful Sith, actually. She remained in a very lowly position, serving as an apprentice to another relatively minor Sith lord there on Dromund Kaas. And she did die giving birth to me. My father always said she was weak."

Lusiel shook her head, snorting softly. "I saw many weak acolytes at Korriban. They were grasping, they lacked discipline. Sometimes they were only afraid and let the fear overwhelm them. No, Quinn. Weakness doesn't survive that place. Trust me." He watched her, saw her mouth tighten with remembering. How many of the weak had Lusiel herself cut down, he wondered. But Lusiel was still thinking of Quinn's family line. She looked at him, intent. "What was your mother called?"

"My mother?” Quinn shrugged, “Her name was Jessa. My father's name was Rymar. What about your parents, my lord?" Lusiel smiled at him. Quinn was far too methodical. And her brother’s programs in her ship’s databanks allowed her to know what type of searches Quinn conducted whenever he was on the bridge. But she indulged him, nonetheless.

"My father's name was Lucian. I'm named for him. His family background was impressive enough, although he was a younger son and possessed no Force abilities of his own." Quinn nodded. "He was lauded a great hero, won enormous awards during the years he doctored Imperials. I remember the medals hanging in rows there on the walls of his office in our home."

"And your mother?"

"Karen." Lusiel spit the name out like it was a curse word, like a piece of filth good only for insulting her most awful opponents. Hatred lined her face as she looked away. Lusiel’s voice was hard, terrible-sounding, "She killed him." Quinn was honestly surprised, and he frowned at her. He had never discovered any hint of such a thing. But Lusiel only shrugged, "I don't know why. She was mad, her mind just … broken. They were arguing, shouting at each other. He was so angry over something she’d done. And suddenly she was hitting him with some heavy sculpture that always sat there on the table."

"You saw it?" Quinn gasped.

Lusiel nodded at him.

"What were they shouting about?"

"I can't really remember, it's all muddled. Sometimes I dream about it and then I remember some of the words. Whatever she’d done was terrible. He wanted her to die for it, probably would have killed her except she struck first. I remember the feel of his hate and rage, and her fear. She was so much afraid of him."

Quinn was troubled by the story. But Lusiel only seemed tired all over again, her eyes blinked slowly into the flames. "It was a long time ago, Quinn."

"I'm sure it remains disquieting."

"Not really. She’s dead."


	25. Bathed in Blood

Lusiel edged along the lip of the cavernous gorge, peering down into the darkness below with a considering look. It seemed to be a perfectly symmetrical cut into the Tatooine surface, as if some monstrous god had come along and carefully scooped away a just-so proportion of sand and rock. Then plunked it down in the absolute center of nothing. The closest weathered hills and dunes could just be discerned off in the distance, anyway.

Lusiel imagined it was the symmetry of the geological form that attracted so many Sand People, because she had been forced to slash her way through a veritable torrent of the brutes, like they were stacked in layers one after another. Quinn following close behind her the entire way, sweat pouring from his brow as he fired his blaster in precise rote form along her side. Now Lusiel brushed at a dried droplet of Sand Person blood left on her gauntleted fist, her ears still ringing from their echoing cries.

"There seems to be no way down, my lord." Quinn scrutinized the chasm facing them with meticulous consideration. If anyone could find a way, Lusiel thought, it would be her Quinn. He gestured northerly. "I think there may be what looks like an outcropping of some kind over there. We should investigate."

Quinn fell into step with her as Lusiel began picking her way along the edge. They didn't talk to each other, concentrating on the progress of their steps. So their progress was punctuated by the shuffling noise their boots made on the sand, grunts or growls when one of their feet would suddenly shift unevenly across the sand that left them to stumble slightly. Lusiel could feel sweat flitting down the center of back under her armor just as they reached the niche that Quinn had observed. She sighed in approval as, together, they examined the section of shelf.

The rocks, here, were aligned in what ended up a series of random ledges leading downward into the gorge. The placement was seamless, perfectly formed. Lusiel couldn’t help but think of some kind of divine design all over again, as if the entire path might have been made using some sort of intelligent mechanic.

But it was obvious the path into the gorge was born of natural forces, cragged and sharp enough it was obvious no kind of tools had been worked into the stone. Fortunate, however. Very fortunate. Lusiel felt far better thinking of entering the darkness below knowing there was a way to get back out, at least. Quinn quickly approached the first ledge and began examining it meticulously.

"It's safe enough for us to climb upon, my lord."

Lusiel grinned at him. "I just won, Quinn."

"Of course, my lord."

Quinn reached his hand up to her, helping Lusiel maneuver down onto the first ledge. She clutched his fingers when he tried to pull his hand back and he frowned at her. She only grinned again, and then ran her fingers back and forth over the palm of his hand. Lusiel had sensed Quinn's discomfort at touching her openly where anyone might see, especially grasping her hands in public gestures that displayed their intimacy.

But she refused to tolerate the feeling, wouldn’t have it between them. She watched him now, as he swallowed convulsively. Quinn looked down at their clasped fingers, entranced by the cadence of her motion. He swore he could feel the heat of her skin even through both their respective gloves. Then he looked back at her, seeing the warm light of her eyes.

"I won't let you fall, my lord," Quinn promised.

"I know."

Lusiel finally let loose Quinn's fingers and gestured for him to proceed. Together, they scrambled down the path of protruding ledges. It was a rather quick descent. But the both of them randomly reached out for the other, with Quinn even reaching up to grasp Lusiel’s waist several times in order to lift her down the path. The progress pleased Lusiel, felt invigorated by the time they both stood together on the floor of the gorge.

Lusiel breathed in deeply, sensing the fluctuation of force energies in the place. She closed her eyes, sinking into a brief trance as she gauged the place for hints and clues of the person she was seeking. And there it was, a wisp of sensation. Like a soft whisper against her senses. Lusiel reached out and grasped the feeling, examined it, widened her perception to determine what it could describe of its maker.

There was … fear, of course. It was like an anxious buzz. Fear, the fear of failure in the task at hand. Fear for others even more than her own self as she moved this same path. But it was tempered, controlled. It did not overwhelm the girl. She was determined to prove herself. To do the right thing. To serve something greater than herself, something noble and virtuous. She would show them all.

Lusiel opened her eyes. Quinn stood there patiently waiting. His gaze focused on her, watching, observing. Lusiel knew he was learning her routines, her habits. Quinn remained fascinated with any hint of her force abilities, she knew. She supposed the interest stemmed from his own lacking of such skills. Regardless, Lusiel accepted his regard for what it was and motioned towards the other end of the ravine.

Quinn murmured to her quietly, although the sound bounced easily back at them, magnified by the yawning rocks that stretched high over their heads. "My lord, I am not certain of this ritual Izeebowe Jeef described. Are you familiar with it?"

Lusiel shook her head, "No. I am quite as determined to succeed as the padawan herself was when she came this way. Walking the same way will help me determine the strength of her ability."

"I see." Quinn appeared thoughtful, as he glanced along the long line of ravine, "I am not sure what the padawan could have done to avoid a physical confrontation with the beast, however. No doubt some Jedi mind manipulation. But if she could quell the beast, even nascent in the force as she is, then surely we can. Then we can slaughter the beast with ease."

Lusiel stopped to stare at him. "Aren’t you concerned about facing the demon?"

He shrugged, not even glancing at her as he stepped along the path. "An unknown enemy is always a concern. But I've seen you overcome fearsome foes before. I am not afraid to follow you, my lord." His confidence in her was wholly solid, heady and real. It moved through her, like something she could only barely understand. Lusiel had only ever sensed such totally belief in one other person …

Both of them felt a sudden shift in the atmosphere, as if something moved nearby. Something large. Something … threatening. Quinn yanked his blaster free of his belt, facing ahead, just as they rounded a curve in the path and the end of the gorge was revealed. Towering above the varied beasts that surrounded it, the sand demon's red eyes, suspended above its head on tall stalks of flesh, kept swinging around the area. It was obviously agitated.

The monster sensed their own approach, like a quivering motion through the Force itself. It didn’t stop its foraging motions through the sand of the gorge floor, although what the beast was actually consuming wasn’t at all obvious. Lusiel only understood the thing was working without stop to satisfy some sort of hunger. Its preoccupation allowed her to step close she could actually _smell_ it, with Quinn stepping carefully alongside her.

Like everything else on Tatooine, the sand demon smelled dry and hot, papery even. It smelled of outdoors and sunlight. But above all it smelled of danger. Lusiel liked the beast as soon as she saw it and straightened into fearless determination. Her dark eyes narrowed as she stalked over to face it.

Quinn followed her, stood directly behind her as the creature raised up into a towering fierce blaze of rage and power over both of them. Lusiel drank in the satisfaction of Quinn’s presence, his easy following her. Her captain was brave, steady. Stars, she wanted him.

A wild roar echoed through the chamber then, as the demon rose up on its back insectoid stalks for legs. Lusiel watched its eyes flare scarlet as it took in the presence of the Sith and her captain, there, angrily bellowing a bitter threat. She felt a bludgeoning threat at her coming through the Force itself, realized the beast was somehow connected to the force energies in the area. She smiled grimly, certain now of her approach.

Lusiel planted her feet squarely, staring up at the sand demon, watching it glare back at her. She raised her fist, saying firmly aloud and through the force, "Stand down, beast! I will not run, I will stand my ground." It growled threateningly at her, but the sand demon became confused, uncertain. "I am not your enemy," Lusiel asserted, calming and steady.  The sand demon shook its head, lowering its visage. It was desperately unsure. Lusiel pressed forward, sending the animal waves of assuredness, determination, lowering her gaze to meditate, and whispering, "We are one, at peace…at peace, creature." Quinn hummed a noise of approval as the sand demon lowered itself to the ground, dazed, and fell into a trance-like sleep.

"Remarkable, my lord. You enchanted it. Not surprising, really." Quinn was walking about the demon, scanning it with several devices and taking careful measurements even as he spoke. He probably wasn't aware of what he'd just said, Lusiel thought. So she smirked at him, "I knew you found me enchanting."

Quinn looked over at her from where he was still circling the demon, startled. He was disconcerted, so he caught himself. "Your natural allure is obvious, my lord. I am only making an observation of its effect on the creature, however."

"Of course," Lusiel chuckled.

Quinn continued his examination, ignoring Lusiel's persistent grin. She began to walk around the beast herself, watching it more through the force than any sort of device. After several minutes the animal began twitching, although it remained asleep throughout. Then a long seam appeared in the skin along the creature's back, blood pouring out and spilling across the ground as the line lengthened and peeled backwards.

Quinn recorded the process. "Fascinating. It seems to be shedding its skin, my lord. And the blood is everywhere, the stench very persistent. It's making my eyes water."

Lusiel eyed Quinn, doubtful. "We should be all right, captain. This is how the padawan succeeded in the ritual without killing the beast. Please take your samples, I'm sure you're just dying to study it later and at your leisure." Lusiel reached down and took up handfuls of the animal's blood, wiping her robes with the stuff, while Quinn prepared several vials with blood and tissue bits.

She gathered some of the blood up into her fingers. "Quinn, stand still." He didn't move, remaining in place as Lusiel reached up her fingers and began running the blood across and down his shoulders. She massaged Quinn's upper arms, rubbing the blood into the fabric of his uniform.

"I believe there's enough blood on me, my lord."

"I simply have to be certain. It would be terrible if the Sand People tried to do you some harm, after all."

"Of course, my lord." Quinn watched Lusiel, his eyes going dark. "How much blood do you think will be necessary?" Lusiel just smiled at him, her fingers moving restlessly against him. Quinn's eyes smoldered back at her, and they stood that way for long moments. Staring and heated, like the blood against their skin.

* * *

 

"How much of that blood did you keep from the beast, captain?" Lusiel asked, watching as yet another group of Sand People ran past them towards the entrance to their camp. They didn't even cry out with their normal ranting screams. It would certainly make their travels through Tatooine far smoother if they didn't have to stop so often to respond to another attack by the maddened people, she thought.

"I could synthesize some sort of repellent, my lord. Given time, of course."

"It would be worth the effort, just to watch them run like that," Lusiel remarked, as one skittish Sand Person choked at the smell of them and stumbled back hurriedly. "It's really quite amusing, don't you think?"

"Would you like me to trip one of them, my lord?"

"Was that an actual joke, Quinn? If you don't watch out, you'll be laughing before long."

"Believe it or not, my lord. I'm laughing right now."

Lusiel grinned as they approached the hut in the center of the village. She looked around interestedly. The entire camp was now pretty much deserted, with dust swirling in lazy circles across the village center. She closed her eyes, centering herself before noticing the panicked approach of what amounted to a single tough, ready Sand Person.

He didn’t want to come to them, was fearful and anxious. Lusiel identified him as the chieften of the village - older than most, well respected, determined to prove his bravery in the face of these demon killers, else lose his position in the tribe. Brave or not, he nearly tossed a piece of fabric at her before he turned and walked hurriedly towards the outer edge of the camp.

Quinn bent over to retrieve the strip of ripped cloth that was marked with some sort of picture. He examined the image carefully, stretching the piece of cloth between both his hands and muttering, "It appears to be some sort of map, my lord. The Breev woman may be able to identify the design and narrow down the location it depicts, my lord. We should make our way towards the rendezvous location."

Lusiel grumbled softly as they both moved to leave the village, scratching against the dry blood on her arms. She glanced at Quinn, curious. "Is there any sort of bathing apparatus in that camping set, Quinn?" Quinn stumbled hard but he caught himself before he really fell over onto the ground in a total humiliating splaying of arms and legs onto the sand. That image – Lusiel’s bare body, naked in the dying light of the desert sun – would likely not vanish from his own fevered imaginings. Ever, really.

Lusiel smirked at him. Which Quinn did ignore, actually.


	26. Mirror, Mirror

Lusiel boldly stepped into the yawning mouth of the canyon, the surrounding cliffs intermittently loosing falling pebbles and rocks that made for tinkling sounds as they tumbled down to the floor below. She felt the moisture there long before she saw it. Any sort of humidity on Tatooine was startling, after all.

But the sense of power – sheer, unadulterated Force power – permeated even the water. Especially the water. Lusiel was struck dumb as the energy flowed through and around her, the invitation implicit. This was a place of ritual, of duty. A task that needed doing.

Lusiel approached the pool, faced it, as well as the mist that rose above it and hovered, suspended in the air. She felt Quinn behind her, his presence ever steady, willing, protective. She closed her eyes and drank him in, all his feelings and awe at the scenery, the pool as well as the walled canyon that surrounded it. "Quinn, leave me here."

Quinn hesitated. Not that she blamed him. They'd been practically inseparable throughout the weeks they'd journeyed across Tatooine. Their meals were shared events, huddling down together over brief resting points, and battles and confrontations alike saw them side by side. Even their sleep pallets had been close together, so they could preserve body heat during the cold nights. Now Quinn beat back his initial anxiety and bowed his head, finally, "Yes, my lord."

Alone, Lusiel stripped. She followed the dictates of the Force, moving to submerge herself in the pool of water, to give up to the Force all the remnants of her journey. All the dust that coated her, all the sand and grit that confounded Quinn's bathing system – all of it belonged to Tatooine and Lusiel gave it back. She dipped her head into the water, allowed the droplets to flow across her smooth skin and back into the pool again. Until finally she was ready and she emerged from the water, walking back to the pile of her clothes and gear with an easy gait.

Her dark hair fell in dripping lengths down to the middle of her back as she knelt there on the edge of the water and proceeded to meditate. She was patient at first, letting her thoughts swirl, moving easily and simply from one subject after another. She settled into a morass of sensation, the feelings ebbing, moving. She began to see images, easy impressions. And she let the words come as they would, the message flowing.

Baras would betray her.

Of course.

It was only a matter of time.

She had to be stronger, smarter than Baras.

She would beat him.

"Your heart is troubled. If only you let loose your fears, your doubts, you could be truly at peace."

Lusiel opened her eyes and gazed at the shining visage before her, the face so like her own, the dark hair mirroring her own. But where her own self was bold and adamant, this creature before her was soft and serene. All that they shared were common features, nothing more. Just mirrors, lacking substance.

"I fear nothing, I doubt nothing. And _that_ is what brings me peace."

Her reflection sorrowed. "Is that truly the life you wish for yourself? One where you constantly anticipate betrayal, where you trust no one?"

"Real trust is knowing I am stronger than they are. They will not ruin me. They will not control me. It is enough."

"There are already plots to destroy you."

"I have no doubt."

"If you accept me, you will gain a peace you'll never have so long as you're lost in the darkness."

"I am not lost."

"If you can not come to the light, then better you're destroyed now."

"You may try. I will overcome you."

"So be it."

She imagined, at first, that fighting herself would be a fight using the same techniques, the same rhythms and song. Yet she discovered quickly it was more a fight of differences than of similarities. Her song, that guided her in a smooth, unbroken dance across the sand, meeting her opponent with order and determined strength, was not tethered by any other light than her own. It was never weakened with a desire for difference. It was just an acceptance, of that part of her own self. That, she knew she'd never change, not really. It was the conflict she needed to still, not her opponent's blade.

So ultimately the light reflection stopped and gazed at her, bowing.

"You have proven yourself, dark one. We are purified, together. The way ahead becomes clear."

Lusiel envisioned a place, rolling hills of dune sands, waves of heat billowing, and a shelter, isolate, secluded. _There_ , she thought. There she would find Yonlach, the Jedi master Baras hoped she would destroy.

"I see where I need to go."

* * *

 

Quinn settled the camp against a rock wall nearby the cavern's entrance, looking over periodically so that he could catch sight of his lord when she emerged from the dark and returned to him. Sharack Breev sat nearby, watching the Imperial work, her dark features alight with curiosity. He was like nothing she'd ever really seen before, as he methodically went about his tasks. The meticulous nature of his effort was truly incredible, she thought.

"The lady Sith is a pretty one. Not like Baras," Breev blurted suddenly.

Quinn looked over at her, gauging her intention in the statement. Baras might be doubtful of his loyalty. Quinn wracked his mind trying to think what he might have said or done that would have Baras concerned. Then he glanced back at the cavern entrance once again.

Quinn said, "My lord Lusiel is lovely, yes."

"Do you touch her?"

"I serve her."

"You serve _all_ of her needs?"

Quinn frowned at her.  Her tone was disrespectful, at least.  He told her, "I serve as required, yes."

"Oh. So you will not serve me? You would not be disappointed, trust me."

He was abrupt. "No."

"Darn," Breev shrugged lightly, seemingly unconcerned as she returned to considering whatever items in her pack she needed for the coming nighttime.

Quinn felt sure he'd just neatly sidestepped a messy predicament. Not that the roguish figure of Sharack Breev lacked attractiveness, either. In some other time and place, one where he’d never laid eyes on Lusiel Phyre, perhaps – although he suddenly could not imagine such a thing, either. And how was it so much of his world had become wrapped around those pretty, slender fingers, Quinn wondered dazedly. But in that sort of distant and impossible existence, he only might have accepted an assignation with this woman here today.

But no matter, not anymore. Quinn was adamantly positive of two very important details which made any overture from the Breev woman utterly flat and unappealing. He actually ticked them off, mentally. Complete with waving pointer fingers, even. One, he honestly didn't want anyone other than the fiery woman who consumed so much of his every thought and bit of attention since he'd met her. And two, of course.

Because Lusiel would literally rip the woman apart, limb from limb. She’d make it hurt. Quinn decided the better option lay in avoiding censure from Baras over losing a woman he still considered a valuable tool on this gods-forsaken world.

"You have nice eyes." Breev informed him suddenly. Quinn looked over at her, his blue eyes dark with heavy disapproval over her persistence.

"Lord Lusiel has made mention of that fact several times," he responded. Firmly.

No one had ever accused Malavai Quinn of being an idiot.


	27. Dragon Pearls

The Breev woman called the pass Forbidden and insisted they should avoid it entirely, declaring them doomed if they even set foot through the narrow confines of the rocky passage through the mountains. As if any Sith might truly abstain from that sort of a gauntlet tossed down in the dust at her feet, Lusiel thought. Doomed, indeed! Lusiel didn’t even snort as she pressed forward and left that silly woman behind.

She wasn’t entirely certain she liked Breev, actually. The female had a nasty tendency of watching the way the taut curves of Quinn’s rear flexed whenever he walked ahead of them.

Now Lusiel was tired. Dust and grit caked her pale features, turned her dark hair gray it was so thick on her head. She wanted a real bath. With water! Cold water! Oh, and maybe one of those fruity drinks she’d enjoyed so much back on Balmorra. Yes!

But she was Sith, and no blasted planet would ever earn the better of a Sith. Or at least not _her_ , Lusiel mentally shrugged. She wouldn’t be terribly unhappy if it swallowed up her own master. The image of Baras being slowly consumed by Tattooine’s sands brought a brief smile to Lusiel’s lips as she continued trudging along the path. And that’s when Lusiel misstepped.

Some small rock likely jumped out of nothing to snatch at her foot, Lusiel was sure. She twisted slightly, but her foot lost purchase against the path and she tumbled down to the ground. Lusiel grumbled with frustration as she sat back up, "Damn this world!" But she’d barely moved before Quinn was there, his hands reaching out to gently grasp her booted foot.

"My lord, let me scan for any possible sprain or broken bone," Quinn insisted. He passed a scanning device over her ankle, still tucked in her boot. "One of the tendons is twisted. I'll need to remove the boot, first."

Lusiel leaned back on her hands, concentrating more on the feel of pebbles and dust under her palms than the sensation in her lower leg as Quinn pulled her boot off. She only hissed when the fiery pain throbbed sullenly against her suddenly-exposed ankle. Quinn moved quickly, pressing a syringe to the flesh of her lower leg before wrapping her ankle and heel in a sticky-tight bandage. He motioned her to stay still as he set about erecting a sturdy shade tent right where Lusiel was perched, until her head and form were entirely covered from the heat of the day. Sitting next to her under the shade, Quinn pulled out some dry rations he proceeded to share with Lusiel.

She mentally counted down: five, four, three, two …

"You should stay off your feet until tomorrow morning, at least, my lord."

"I won!"

Quinn sighed.

* * *

 

There was a heavy silence in the pass, like a weight pressed down on the very air itself. If Quinn had to guess, he would've said it felt as if everything in the area was hiding. Even the wind. The real question was what would make for such incredible suspense. Because that's what it felt like, like everything was waiting to see what would happen next. Quinn stopped, scanning upwards towards the top of the cragged rocks that loomed over their heads on both sides. He frowned.

Lusiel walked ahead of him, her hips swaying. Watching her move along had occupied much of Quinn’s attention all through the morning, actually. She moved so fluidly, like a sleek, deadly creature, something beautiful and gorgeously dangerous. She’d allowed his attendance, basked in his care of her injury and the touches of his hands against her leg. And now she moved without any discernible sign she ever fell down, a testament to Quinn’s skill even in the barest field, he thought.

Lusiel slowly stopped, too. She was far enough ahead of Quinn to appreciate what scared every nook and cranny of the pass into such terrible warning, at least. She palmed her lightsaber slowly, her fingers trailing along its hilt with easy familiarity.

She'd heard stories about them, of course. It was said the Sand People used Krayt Dragons as targets in their turning of age rituals, making their youngest men venture out against the beasts before they were allowed back into the tribe. Jawas proved their bravery hunting the dragons' bones. Lusiel had only never imagined laying eyes on one.

Of course, she'd never thought a Krayt Dragon would lay eyes on her, either. This one did, though. She mentally sighed, thinking to add yet another item onto her list of things to hate about Tatooine. Then she centered herself, moving into a smooth battle position from which to meet the beast when it made its charge.

Lusiel commanded him without turning her attention away from the beast, "Quinn, keep your distance! Don't draw its attention! Focus on keeping me up if I take too hard a hit!" The reptilian creature swung its leathery head back and forth, threateningly, the immense horns and spikes along its neck and back bristling and shaking in its growing agitation. It stomped huge pawed feet, once, then twice. Lusiel tensed, as the giant beast finally leaped forward, rushing at her in a full bullish charge. She watched its two-pronged tail swinging behind the creature.

At the last possible second, Lusiel sprang upward into the air, sailing effortlessly through the air over its head, twisting as she went, so that she could swipe downwards with her lightsaber, catching the creature along the side of its scaly head. She landed with a bounding step on the animal's back and ran along its spine, slashing left and right alongside the creature's body as she chased towards its end. With a yelp she jumped again just as she reached the top of its tail, sailing forward in a mighty leap through the Force and the air alike, swinging her lightsaber to smoothly remove the two-pronged end of the Dragon's tail.

The Krayt Dragon screamed out, the sound echoing along the pass with such awesome force stones rained down from the cliffs above. In the distance, Lusiel discerned the responding cries of some Sand People.

The animal spun around to face Lusiel once again, its bleeding tail sending a veritable shower of blood flying as it went. Lusiel saw Quinn, standing distantly from the Krayt Dragon as she'd directed, pulling an explosive charge from his pack and preparing it for detonation as methodically as he did everything. Then the beast was charging her again. Lusiel waited, swinging her saber patiently, watching the rampaging animal approach. Quinn shouted something to her, frantic-sounding. Lusiel jumped at the last second, off to the side, watching as the Krayt Dragon ran full-force into the rock wall behind her, a cruel crunching sound echoing through the pass.

Lusiel approached the dying beast, her chin tilted at a proud angle. She watched the blood drip from its smashed face as Quinn trotted over to join her. Together they stood and listened to the animal's last breaths. Then Lusiel turned to Quinn.

"Would you happen to know how to locate this beast's gizzards, captain?"

"It would seem obvious, wouldn't it?"

"Quinn, if I relied upon the obvious, we'd use that bomb you were putting together. But I figure we'd have a better chance of finding dragon pearls if you point out its gizzards to me."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Note: I was always curious about the anxiety Sharack Breev expressed when the warrior said she would head into the Dune Sea. It's almost anticlimatic that you head out to the Dune Sea and find a little hut, then. So this is my attempt to add a bit of drama to Lusiel's journey to finally meet up with Yonlach.
> 
> Note, too: dragon pearls result from a natural process of the Krayt Dragon's digestive system. The Krayt Dragons would consume rocks and stones that would then tumble in their gizzards in order to better process the foods the animals consumed. Over time of tumbling all around in there, the rocks would take on the form of colorful stones that force users could use in making their lightsabers. The things were highly valuable, for their beauty and as hunting trophies.


	28. Only a Glimpse and a Name

Jedi Master Yonlach waited for her to arrive. He sensed her approach, watched her in his dreams. The darkness of her coming had sometimes proved overwhelming, leaving him to cry out against the promise of peril she represented. And now he sighed deeply, gazing upon her and marshaling his own peace and calm to meet her.

His once-padawan was bold, forthright as he stepped between them both, "Master Yonlach, the Sith you've been tracking is upon us. Retreat to safety. I will take the intruder on." Ah, Yu-li. Yonlach thought how terrible it would be, for such boldness to become lost and broken. He waved his hand, guiding Yu-li back.

"No, Yu-li. Control your feelings. Stand at my side. I will face this trespasser," Yonlach replied, his tone slow and even in cadence. The younger Knight subsided, standing next to Yonlach even as he retained his weapon in a strong fighting stance.

The Sith canted her head she watched them, patiently regarding them and silent. Yonlach frowned, suddenly uncertain. His experience did not appreciate any Sith so calm, focused and centered in her own self. They tended towards darker emotions, ones that ceded power and strength in their sheer brilliance – anger, hate and fear paramount. They lost sight of the power gained from control over one self, through readied preparedness and patience. This Sith defied those conventions.

She was striking, her skin pale, her eyes darkest brown shining big in her face, and her black hair thick, gathered together at the back of her head. Her presence in the force was impressive – ardent and powerful – a consuming strength that compelled, like a swell at the seaside that could simply overtake the unprepared. He felt her like she was a surge set to overtake him, knew that she could easily consume Jaesa, overwhelm and destroy her entirely. He mourned, only briefly.

He himself didn't imagine emerging from this confrontation wholly. At the least he would be forced to destroy this Sith. Or he would be destroyed by her. Either course would be painful for Jaesa. "I know why you've come, Sith. Master Nomen Karr's apprentice threatens you somehow. You hope to flush her into the open and silence her." Yonlach confronted the Sith.

"I have no idea what you're talking about." The Sith shook her head at him. Behind her, her companion shifted, and Yonlach glanced briefly at the man. He sensed no Force abilities in him, although his devotion to the Sith was strong. No, the true threat remained the Sith herself.

"Don't insult me, child. You are an open book to me. You're here for her, I know it."

"Bah, I’m not insulting you, Jedi. How petty you are, supposing at my intentions with such simplistic rationales. I mean your little padawan no harm, though."

Behind him, Yu-li scoffed loudly. But Yonlach only shook his head tiredly, patient in the face of her intransience. "Do not think to manipulate me so easily, Sith. I am no student to the trickery of your kind. The harm you would visit on her is real enough, even if you called it something else. What you would do to her would ruin her utterly.” Yonlach sighed, “Besides, it is too late. She and I are linked, bonded through the force, after her journey here for guidance. I have already warned her of your manipulations."

" _I_ only seek to talk to her. Is her direction so fragile, then? What is it you fear she may gain from simply hearing what it is I have to say?" The Sith retorted.

"I have already said I will not be fooled," Yonlach shrugged. "The disparity in our abilities is equal to the disparity in our ages. You can not win. Turn away now."

"Oh, I fear no one," the Sith asserted, crossing her arms over her chest in blatant defiance. Yonlach ached for her, this youngster of a woman taught only to battle through fear and intimidation.

"I only speak truth, fact -- not threats. I am a full Jedi Master. And Yu-li has greater command of lightsaber technique than any Jedi Knight I've trained,” Yonlach waved one of his hands through the air, trying to impress her. Her dark eyes narrowed dangerously at him, but she remained centered even then. Yonlach sighed, “Please, girl. You can not win."

"My lord," the Sith's companion stepped forward, leaning his head down in a respectful motion towards the Sith. He spoke so quietly, murmuring low enough Yonlach could not discern what he said. But the confidence his mere presence provided the Sith was manifest in the turn of her form to meet his approach, the way she leaned into him as he spoke. The pair shared affection, care and support of each other. It was obvious.

She smiled at him, tilted her chin upwards in determined disagreement with whatever he told her. The Sith shook her head, "They already underestimate us both, Quinn.” Then she turned burning eyes towards Yonlach. “But especially me.”

Yonlach reacted boldly. He gestured, pushing the Force against the Sith’s man in a single, harsh blow. The strike staggered the man’s mind, left him gasping in pain and shock just before he stumbled. His hands reached towards his blaster, his blue eyes flying to the Sith in startled dismay as if his every thought, every blazing focus was only to protect her and never mind how much pain rippled through his entire form right then, how much it ravaged his mind and body. Then he collapsed onto the floor of the small house, groaning in agony, his legs bent sideways as he finally fell unconscious.

And Yonlach felt it, then. Felt the power of the Sith’s rage, the thrilling strength of her anger lighting the entire space as she lowered her head to glare hard at him. She growled like one of the Dragons out in the Dune Sea, sweared at him, “You hurt him. How dare you … Hurt. _Him_.” Yonlach sensed her cry through the Force itself, the power of it moving like a compelling wave that swept over them all. He almost stumbled back from the strength of her feelings, glanced down at the unconscious figure with new awareness.

A brief glimpse broke through Yonlach's awareness, a vision swept him.

A girl -- powerful, beautiful, wielding crimson-red dual lightsabers in a glorious display of synchronized motions. He watched her dance through a song of power and strength, thrilling to the Force that moved within her. Her eyes gazed back at him and they were blue, blue eyes, the man’s eyes, set in a feminine face so much like her mother’s. She stopped, looked at him in so brief a moment, and she whispered to him, "You don't belong here, old man."

Yonlach sighed, aware once more of the Sith, watching as she pulled her lightsaber free and faced him squarely. Yu-li was shrieking a wild battle cry and leaping forward, and the Sith yelled back at him, her legs braced to meet his rushing attack. Yonlach saw the red flare of her blade, heard it singing loudly.

He didn't look away, not from the future which would not be stolen from this Sith today. He only stepped forward, into his death.

* * *

 

Quinn opened his eyes to blinding light, felt like a hammer had taken up some kind of permanent residence in his head. He groaned, reached up to rub his forehead and touched Lusiel's hand, there. She had pushed the hair at his temple back and was running her finger along his upper brow in slow cadenced motions, murmuring indistinctly.

He looked, saw the dead body of the Jedi Master, the Knight next to him unconscious. Quinn groaned again, "I failed you."

" _I_ succeeded. And we’re both well. There wasn’t any failure," Lusiel shrugged. She was the superior, the more powerful of them both. She was the one who shielded him, who kept anyone from hurting him. That he endured any pain even in the moment was offensive to her, and she glared one more time towards the Jedi Master’s broken body.

Quinn still hurt, his head throbbed sullenly with pain. He carefully prepared a medical treatment, his fingers only slightly trembling. "At least my assistance proved unnecessary. I would not have forgiven myself otherwise. Are we done here, then?" Quinn ran his eyes along Lusiel’s frame, examining her for any small sign of injury. Even before doctoring his own distress, preparing an antidote for the pain settled in the center of his forehead.

Lusiel shrugged, "I know the padawan's name now. Hopefully Darth Baras is satisfied and we can get off this damn rock."


	29. Holotransmissions

Vette returned to the ship, rushing up the ramp with her packages in hand. She sang out for Toovee as she entered, heard the clank of his metallic feet against the floor as he responded. She tossed sundry packages onto the lounge seats with a negligent wave, pulling free the purple chef's hat she'd managed to scrounge from some smuggler loitering in the cantina near the market of Mos Ila. With a flourish, she plunked the article on top of Toovee's head.

"There! Make sure you wear this whenever you prepare meals, Toovee." Vette instructed sternly, waving her finger at the droid with imperious certainty she was pretty sure wouldn’t make an iota of impact. But it was fun, regardless. "And don't let Quinn take it away from you!"

Toovee warbled in his funny voice, "Master has informed me I am to obey any direction provided me by Captain Quinn, Vette."

Vette harrumphed, "Figures. I honestly don't know what she sees in him."

"In regards Captain Quinn, there's an incoming transmission on the holoterminal. An Imperial officer has been requesting the captain’s response." Toovee reported, its voice mechanically affable.

"Really? Did you tell him Quinn isn't on board?"

"Yes, Vette. But he remains quite insistent he speak to the captain immediately."

Vette was curious. She'd responded to several incoming calls from Darth Baras, although she never actually spoke to the man, just forwarded his transmissions to Lusiel. It wouldn't be out of hand for her to respond to this new transmission, would it? She might dig up some dirt on Mr. Fancy Pants, and wouldn't that be fun, Vette thought. She practically rubbed her blue hands together as she approached the console.

The officer in question was human, of course. A very young lieutenant. Vette bet to herself this was his first assignment as an Imperial officer. He pinched his narrow face even further when he saw Vette's image on the holo, until he looked like he couldn’t even breathe through that thin line of nose in the center of his face. Oh, just fantastic, she thought. The Empire's xenophobic hatred of anything non-human or Sith really was grating sometimes.

The officer barked at her, his tone implying _she_ was the dog in the conversation. Vette considered yipping back at him, actually. "I am seeking the person of Malavai Quinn. Is he there? That droid wasn't particularly helpful. Is there some issue with its voice parameters?"

Vette stared back at the officer, pursed her lips in something that might have looked like thoughtfulness. She shrugged, “Oh,Quinn's been working on Toovee but I think the droid's getting the better of him. It's actually quite impressive. Not much gets past Quinn."

"So he _is_ there? Why isn't he responding to my call, then?" The officer glared at her, as if Vette had Quinn locked away nearby. Like in a box, maybe. Actually, that wasn’t really a bad idea, she thought.

Vette sniffed. "Didn't Toovee tell you he isn't onboard at the moment?"

"Well, where is he?" Now he sounded oh-so-properly condescending. If he were close enough, he’d probably try twisting one of her lekku.

Vette bristled. "As if I would tell you, even if I knew. He's helping my master Lusiel with her scary Sithy business, anyway. _I_ don't ask questions about it. Bad for the digestion. He did leave me a list of things I was supposed to do while he was gone, though. I haven't gotten around to most of it."

He pointed a long, narrow finger at her, "I insist on speaking to Malavai Quinn immediately!"

Vette rolled her eyes this time. "I just told you! Captain Quinn is not currently on board the ship. There. I even used clear and precise words so you'd understand me better this time!"

"Captain? What do you mean _captain_?’ He made the word sound like something a cat puked up into the floor, Vette thought. One of those ugly husk-looking things all ground up with hair. Yuck. “I'd heard the outrageous report he'd been reassigned. But Malavai Quinn isn't allowed to do any such thing. He's _especially_ not allowed promotion to captain."

Vette almost laughed at the agitated lieutenant. Even through the holographic transmission she could see him turning red. "Look, don't ask me. I've been a Sith slave for months now. I do what they tell me to. So if you want to know how and why he's Captain Quinn now and currently flying all over the place in his newly assigned ship, you'll have to take it up with one of them. And hey! Good luck with that."

"Moff Broysc won't stand for this!"

"Hey, guy! Don't know who that is! Ask Moff Broysc to contact Darth Baras. They may make fantastic pals. Who knows?" Vette shrugged lightly, utterly unconcerned.

"We'll see about this, mark my words."

"Yep, marked! Have a nice day!" Vette waved a little blue hand at the guy in his oh-so-starchy uniform, watching as the transmission faded abruptly. Then she turned to Toovee, gave the droid a bewildered look as she shook her head.

"I don't get it, Toovee. Is there some kind of requirement for admittance to the Imperial military that goes something like, 'Don't apply unless you're a jerk'?"


	30. Make no Mistake

Quinn couldn't sleep.

Not so unusual, really. Quinn typically worked until his body quite literally collapsed from sheer exhaustion, before seeking any bed. Lusiel had become angry when she discovered him sleeping in a heap over one of the consoles the second and third times she caught him at it. He was currently under orders to upgrade the seating on the bridge to indulge his personal comfort. She’d glared at him, “If this is the only blasted place you will sleep, Quinn, you’ll make sure your body’s allowed some degree of accommodation in order to accomplish it. Is that understood?” Quinn was rather more impressed Lusiel understood his nature well enough to give him support in the space he was most inclined to occupy, actually, so he nodded sharply in agreement.

At the moment, he sat in the navigator’s seat of the bridge watching the stars drift by through the windows, idly tapping his finger against the console as he thought.

He had locked in the navigation plot towards the Imperial Fleet already. Lusiel wanted to properly market those dragon pearls she cut loose from the guts of the Krayt Dragon she killed in the Forbidden Pass, and several ships in the Fleet hosted tradesmen who might assist her in the endeavor. The red pearl Lusiel intended to keep, to have it crafted into her own lightsaber. She said it would increase the weapon's potency. Quinn felt a thrill of immense satisfaction at the thought of Lusiel being even more deadly than she was already.

Which brought Quinn to thinking of the Sith he served with so much sheer enjoyment. Watching Lusiel was like watching a symphony, the most incredible of masterpieces. Lusiel was very quickly becoming in Quinn's mind the epitome of Sith power and rule. He was losing sight of anything past service to her, in fact. And his growing dissatisfaction with the role Baras once asked of him was growing stronger every day.

It didn't help that Quinn had started obscuring so much of the insight he gained in his day-to-day interactions with Lusiel. He never told Baras what Lusiel said of her family, for one. Quinn sensed that betraying that particular bit of her confidence really would break something precious between them. He would lose her.

So he embellished every small instance during their time on Tatooine that described her faithfulness to Baras, rather. She was overly respectful of the Breev woman, only thanks to Baras’ own esteem of her. She never backed down and resolutely faced the wilds of the desert planet rather than give up, all to complete the task Baras had set her upon. And she proudly declared her loyalty of Baras to the Jedi Yonlach during their confrontation. Quinn played it all up, using the best and most glowing terms he could manage.

None of it fooled Baras. "Are you growing overly sentimental where my apprentice is concerned, Quinn?" Darth Baras sent tendrils of Force ability against him, wrapped him in the strands of threat as he squirmed in his seat there on the bridge and out of sight from either Lusiel or Vette.

"I'm not typically given to sentiment, actually," Quinn responded. It was an evasion and no sort of answer, and Baras glared at him for skirting around the truth.

"Make no mistake, Quinn. If I feel there's any threat from my apprentice, I _will_ destroy her. If you lie to me, I'll assume there's a threat." Baras had pointed a heavy finger at Quinn, his masked face shining through the holotransmission. Quinn felt the press of Baras’ power on his chest, felt his breath tightening painfully.

"I would not lie to you, my lord. Everything I've spoken of is absolutely true, after all. I understand completely it's impossible to deceive you." Quinn gasped out.

"Good. I'm glad we understand each other," Darth Baras concluded.

So now Quinn sat, contemplating the quandary. Because his fear as Baras threatened him hadn't been for his own safety. All he could think as Baras twisted his breathing into the most painful wheezes, was the fear he might say or do something, anything that might compromise Lusiel. He could not allow her to be harmed, he realized.

As Quinn sat there watching the stars sliding along he began to understand, only barely, there was no way for him to prevent the inevitable confrontation between the two Sith.

And it wasn't Baras he hoped would win.


	31. The Bet

"Hey, sweet cheeks! Why doncha jump up there an' swing them head tails 'round, too, huh?"

Vette shot the drunken human in his standard-issue technician’s uniform the snidest sort of smile, her features pinched with dramatically manufactured friendliness. Because the only good a Twi’lek was for, was shaking her ass up on a table, she thought to herself. "Oh, hey! You first! Pretty sure you won’t be able to keep yourself up there long enough to make a single rotation on the pole, though."

"Wahhht? Watch shiss, girlie!" The heavily intoxicated youth stumbled over to the table where a pretty red-skinned Twi-lek was gyrating to the pulsing beat of the music. He shouted at the dancer who tried ignoring him, and then proceeded to yank her down off the platform she was balanced upon. Security pounced on the over-young technician in terribly short order. Vette laughed as she watched two burly brutes dump the sod into the nearest lift heading down out of the VIP Lounge.

Ah, good times, Vette smiled.

"You did that on purpose." Quinn said from across the table.

"Duh. Come on, Captain Stick in the Mud. Live a little!" Vette rolled her eyes at him.

"Living shouldn't require increasing the work load of the staff of this lounge, Vette. That dancer, for one thing, probably wouldn't thank you right now." He lifted his chin in the dancer’s direction, where she was being roundly scolded by a slight-figured human man in fancy dress. Obviously the proprietor of the drinking establishment, he was admonishing the slave for the disruption. Complete with pointed fingers and angry threats.

Vette turned back to glare at him. Mollified he had made a point even Vette had a difficult time disputing, Quinn leaned back to scan the growing crowd of lounge patrons for Lusiel. She had insisted on space to attend her business with one of the Fleet’s vendors, a tradesman marketing pearls and other sundry materials used in crafting weapons and armors. Quinn had been rather fascinated over some of the slicing components on display at the man’s corner booth, in fact. But Lusiel was adamant and he retreated to give her privacy.

A group of soldiers at the next table began yelling and pounding their fists on their table all of sudden, all of them leaning to watch the holoscreens overhead depicting a particularly vicious round of Huttball. Quinn glanced at the screens himself, to verify the Frog Dogs were, in fact, winning. Then he returned to drinking … Quinn lifted the glass up to eye level, trying to identify what sort of liquor was in it that made for such a brilliant blue color. He only sipped it after Vette informed him loudly it was Lusiel’s favorite beverage. Surprisingly enough, the drink really was quite good. It tasted of some sort of exotic fruit, he thought.

"You didn't drink mine, did you?" Lusiel smiled as she slid into her seat, placing several packages at her feet. Vette leaned over, trying to determine what if any of the wrapped bundles contained items for her but not daring to actually ask.

Vette snorted, not looking up from her bent position. "Please! He's barely drunk his own. The day I see a Quinn drunk off his ass, I'm posting the vid on the holonet."

"It will never happen," Quinn asserted.

"Ho! A challenge! You're under notice now, captain. I'll endeavor to get you drunk somehow, some day and the ensuing shenanigans will be recorded. Whether they are observed or not may be negotiated. Maybe. Depends on how funny I find it. Is it a deal?" Vette held her hand out towards Quinn.

"It’s simply not possible, Vette," Quinn responded.

"Then there's no reason not to let me try."

Quinn eyed her warily. "You can't tamper with the food and drink dispensers I use, Vette. Any food and drink dispensers. None. Anywhere."

Vette pouted, watching her easy triumph blow away like a balloon losing its air, complete with fizzy screeching sound. Still, the challenge itself would be fun. She nodded eagerly, both her lekku bouncing against her shoulders with her excitement as she reached out a blue hand for the captain to shake. It wasn't long before Vette was bounding her way across the lounge, intent on talking to one of the Twi’lek servers she was very certain she recognized.

"You've made her happy. Chances are she'll stay busy dreaming up ways to get you inebriated, now." Lusiel remarked, watching the back of their Twi’lek compatriot while sipping her cocktail.

"If it keeps her busy enough to stay off the bridge, I’ve more than succeeded."


	32. You are an Imbecile

Chrimar Noven felt himself tumble to the floor after a hard shove in the back from the madwoman. She simply had to be mad, anyway. It was the only explanation for the morning's events.

Which had been proceeding relatively well until _she_ stormed over to his table at the café and bodily restrained him, actually. He had cried out piteously against her diabolical abuse, most especially when she handily thrust a slave collar onto his neck. It had done no good begging her to desist, though. There was a dark-haired fellow behind her that even asked if she required assistance with placing the collar properly! Rather than responding to any of Chrimar’s pleas, any request he made to know what he'd done to earn such horrid mistreatment, the madwoman only slapped him hard across the back of the head and hummed approval over the placement of the stiff collar against his neck.

It was simply beyond belief! He was a proud and free nobleman of Alderaan, after all. Such indignities were not to be tolerated. It’s precisely what he’d taken to shouting in the lounges and cafes throughout the city at every chance, and she was proving it all correct!

But the woman only tugged him unceremoniously through the streets, even as he stumbled along behind her and whined wretchedly in his distress. The few times he fell the woman yanked him back up again, hard, pulling against his arm and shoulder to such a point he was quite certain she actually injured him. By the gods, she was strong! How did such a small woman manage to very nearly carry him along?

Worse, though, was the pinch of the collar, as it twisted against the pale, sensitive skin at the back of his neck. The madwoman's companion, that man with black hair who offered to help with his mortifying abuse, haphazardly handled the collar's control device. He basically bounced it against his upper thigh as they marched through the streets. Chrimar wasn’t entirely certain what would actually happen when the button on the device was pressed but he'd heard stories of the pain it caused.

By the time the madwoman tugged and pulled Chrimar through the doors of the Thul palace, he was wailing and blubbering real tears and spittle. The woman gripped the back of his head, her nails digging into the soft skin of his scalp as she yanked him across the finest lengths of soft carpets towards the throne. That’s where she finally shoved him into a heap right there at Lord Jorad’s feet.

Jorad, by the graces above, bless him, jumped to his feet in shock and horror. "Chrimar? Is that Chrimar Noven? That's a free nobleman of Alderaan! Unhand him! Who are you? What do you think you're doing?"

Chrimar Noven climbed slowly, painfully to his feet. The ready and verbal support from Lord Jorad emboldened him and he eyed the madwoman with bitter recrimination. He even growled at her! Then the black-haired man handed the woman the control device to the collar lying heavy against Chrimar’s neck, and he whimpered loudly again. He shuddered back from them, cowering against Lord Jorad’s throne.

The madwoman was unfazed. She waved her hand through the air, allowing the light to glitter over the surface of the device she was holding. "If you are to join the Empire, you should take more care to recognize those with power."

Chrimar's eyes widened with renewed horror. His gaze swept the woman from head to toe, from her dark features, with her ebony tresses and deeply brown eyes, down across the red robe that covered a blackened metallic breastplate, matching leg pieces, all the way to her cruel-looking heavy boots, and he knew. Tales of the Sith were whispered in the darkest of nights, of their cruelty and their horrible power. It was said they _enjoyed_ torture, they _thrilled_ at killing! He'd scoffed at the thought anyone could be so evil. But now he knew.

The stories were all true.

The Sith who ruled the Empire were, indeed, terrible and evil. They had come to Alderaan to torment and abuse all of them, even the best and most noblemen. None of them could escape their dire threat.

Lord Jorad started sputtering and bowing to the Sith. "M … My lord!"

His day couldn't possibly get any worse! How dare Lord Jorad bow to this … this monster! Chrimar spat out his condemnation of the Thul lord's cowardice. "All of Alderaan will be thrown into chains because of you," Chrimar declared.

That's when it happened. The Sith looked at him, unperturbed, and waved aside his proud words. Quite simply, to boot. "Silence," she told him, "The sooner you see reason, the easier it will be." Then she raised the control device and pressed the button. She appeared _bored_ as she did it. Like she didn't even care!

The pain ripped through him like a rabid whipping force, moving down his spine in a vivid arch of sensation. He felt his teeth sizzling, his hair standing on end, his back arching. He yelped and cried out a mad scream of agony, his head thrown back. His bladder released suddenly and the smell of urine swept through the place.

Chrimar fell down to the floor where he began to sob, utterly broken and defeated. Utterly demoralized. Above him, Lord Jorad was talking but Chrimar couldn't actually understand the words. But he knew that a holo projection appeared and began jabbering into the exchange, as well. The man in the image was the representative from the Empire tasked to bring Thul to victory over the Organas. Chrimar began to re-gather his shattered thoughts and gradually listened to the conversation, as the mad people actually commanding the Thuls plotted efforts to undermine the Organa offensive. What was most horrible of all was that the Sith - the madwoman who'd so terribly, so evil-mindedly abused him - she was made the ultimate leader of the course!

Chrimar staggered back to his feet, facing the lot of them with his fists clenched. He announced, his voice pitifully dry and broken, "You'll never find them! They have top-of-the-line cloaking, better than anything the Empire makes! No probes will get through, no spy-sats, nothing!" Chrimar scowled angrily at the Sith, determined that she at least knew of his disdain.

She did. It finally occurred to him she only didn't care. Dryly, she raised the control device once more, and Chrimar began to cry again. He begged her, his hands held up in front of him. "You are an imbecile," she said to him. He heard the click of the button. Then everything went black.


	33. There's Always a Bigger Fish

Quinn shifted his shoulders, just enough to feel again the new tug against his neck of that silver chain and the rub of the pendant along the center of his chest, just under his throat. A gift from her. He had discovered the intricately carved box containing the necklace on the plush seat of the navigator’s chair only yesterday. Because of course she would know which one of the newly upgraded seats on the bridge had quickly become his favorite.

The box itself was utterly gorgeous and fine, made of dark mahogany wood that matched Lusiel's eyes and overlaid with silvery metallic swirls Quinn suspected were electrum. Quinn had tucked the box into his personal effects, far from the reach of prying eyes. He knew he'd never be able to look at it without thinking of her.

But he placed the jewelry around his neck. The necklace was silver, rather thick, obviously designed for a man to wear. But it was the pendant that truly inspired. Suspended from a silver clasp, the dark blue of the dragon pearl ceaselessly swirled with a luminescent sheen.

It wasn't one of the pearls Lusiel won from Tatooine. Actually, it was far smaller than any of the ones they had acquired together. Lusiel must have bartered for this particular pearl, probably traded one of her own larger trophies in order to obtain it. The effort she put into finding such a particular jewel conveyed the level of worth and value she had for him, so he persisted in shifting his body just enough to feel the weight of the thing against his warm skin. The restless motion that was quickly forming into a habit kept him firmly planted in that room of his mind he'd long since allocated to contemplations of Lusiel, and he allowed his thoughts to meander there quite enjoyably.

Right now the pearl bounced lightly under his field jacket as he followed Lusiel through the doorway into the highly pretentious office at Duke Kendoh’s estate. Quinn glanced around, eyeing the extravagant curtains and wall hangings that stretched high overhead to the looming ceiling, the garish lounge seats and cushioned sofas scattered throughout the yawning space, and the ornate fixtures set into every wall, nook and cranny of the room. He frowned, rather disgusted at the lurid display.

Kendoh was a small, wiry figure of a man. His hair was graying, but it was still thick on the top of his head and on his face where he’d grown out a rather bushy mustache. At the moment, Duke Kendoh was laughing disdainfully over the bickering complaints of two rather flamboyantly dressed Alderaanian noblemen displayed over the holoterminal on the far side of the room, “Why do you persist in foisting your family rules on me? You’ll do well to remember what I can do to you both!” Lusiel stopped in the center of the doorway, taking in the room, the Duke and the ring of Sith warriors circling the place. Quinn noted the glances those Sith in the place slanted towards her, before they returned their watchful gazes back to the Duke they were obviously guarding.

Lusiel kept her attention on the altercation playing out in Duke Kendoh's office. Kendoh muttered even more threats after the two fellows abruptly disconnected their communications, and Lusiel stepped forward. The nobles on Alderaan presented themselves arrogantly certain of their own value, as if their world was so much more important than it truly was; a pomposity based on absolutely nothing, basically. The entire planet would benefit from the order and stability the Empire could afford them, Quinn thought.

Lusiel approached the Duke as soon as the holotransmission faded, “Duke Kendoh. Darth Baras sent me.” Quinn remained several steps behind her, watching as the Duke turned to face Lusiel. The little man ran his eyes boldly up and down Lusiel’s figure, his gaze lingering on her breasts and thighs. Quinn clenched his jaw as the Duke smiled lasciviously and meandered in a wide circle around Lusiel’s trim form. She followed his progress, her dark eyes watching him as he hummed and paced around to face her again. Duke Kendo judged Lusiel like she was some bit of meat good only for tasting. But Lusiel merely gave the man a bored, disinterested stare, leaning into her right hip as she crossed her arms negligently across her chest.

The Duke frowned at her, stepping forward as if to intimidate Lusiel with his power and authority. Lusiel, however, was left looking down at the little man, ruining any semblance of dominance he might have had over the situation. Quinn knew her well enough to guess she was biting her tongue to keep from laughing.

"A woman Sith. I've never seen one of those before. All the other Sith who serve me, here, are men." His head was aligned with Lusiel's firm breasts and he arrogantly kept his eyes peeled there. He waved towards one of the nearby couches, "I don't normally appreciate being interrupted. However, I might make an exception. For you, lady Sith."

Quinn pursed his lips. The biting offense he was feeling kept him from shaking his head at the fool man, warningly. He honestly didn’t care enough to impress the man of the danger he was prodding. No, Quinn rather hoped the man shaking his tiny cock at Lusiel and expecting her to be impressed might experience a Force-strong blow that snapped his silly little neck, actually. So he only subsided, settling back onto the balls of his feet while he waited.

The watchful Sith guards noted Quinn’s stance, too.

Lusiel pointed a gloved finger towards Kendoh, "Darth Baras told me you had information I might use to complete my task on this world."

Duke Kendoh snorted indelicately. "As if I care anything at all what Darth Baras wants. He’s a blip in my consideration! There are matters of far more importance than some small girl Baras wants me to seek out for him. If you’re so interested in finding her long-lost family, hop to it yourself!"

"Perhaps you should strive to redefine your priorities, Duke Kendoh. You may discover that certain ambitions take precedence. Breathing, for instance.” Lusiel fired back at him.

"Oh ho! A threat!" Duke Kendoh chuckled, low and meanly. He leaned closer to her, until his face was practically hovering straight over the curves of her breasts and his breath washed over her chin. She sniffed against the heavy scent of the man’s cologne that wafted up at her. Kendoh chuckled, "I might have made our interlude rather pleasant. But my guards here will make you pay for threatening me. Have you ever been held down? Too bad, really. I’ll send what’s left of you back to your master with my regards.” Lusiel’s eyes became flinty when Kendoh mentioned holding her, but she only glared at the little man as he ambled over to a nearby couch and lounged back against its center. Quinn’s hand twitched as he fought the urge to shoot the bastard.

Kendoh waved negligently at one of the nearby Sith. "Fimmress, make this intruder a distant memory will you?" Quinn regarded the warrior who stiffened angrily as the Duke insisted. Fimmress looked over towards Lusiel and nodded slightly. The man was thick and broad-shouldered, tough-looking with dark hair cut so short it was only a brief fuzz on the top of his head. His armor was a dark red quite typical of the Sith, and he was just as imperceptibly quiet as Lusiel, too.

Fimmress turned to face the Duke. "You do not understand, Duke Kendoh. We are assigned to protect you and support your interests in the struggle for Alderaan." His eyes hardened, "But we serve the Emperor first. And we will not cross Darth Baras. _Or_ his apprentice." Lusiel’s chin went up in approval as the Sith lining the walls one after another faced her, bowing low. Fimmress looked at her, “We consider you an ally. And a friend.” He bowed, saluting Lusiel with his hand placed across his own heart and his head lowered in blatant respect.

The implication of nuanced political motions was obvious, the reality of Sith dominance overriding everything. Beyond the walls of this place eddied far larger pools with much greater and more deadly fish at play. Those Sith in this room were already swimming there and determined to swim for longer a time, each moving carefully into position. And Lusiel was already a step ahead of the rest of them. Friendship with her secured them, more than anything some minor noble lord on Alderaan could ever gain on their behalf.

Duke Kendoh was only just realizing what a tiny little fish he really was.

Lusiel didn't smile or otherwise remark to the duke as he began to fidget in his seat. He finally rose awkwardly to his feet, rocking on his heels and snapping his fingers nervously as he stared down at the floor. “Well. Ahem … yes. Dreadfully sorry for the … Well, it’s a rather bad misunderstanding, I suppose. I was obviously hasty in disregarding your master's needs. How might I make amends?"

Lusiel responded politely enough, barely mentioning the “misunderstanding”. Which Quinn well knew obscured how angry she really was. Lusiel was more charming in her approach to those she liked or even merely tolerated. The boredom in her current tone was more indicative of menace. Quinn was fairly certain she was plotting the Duke’s death, only just standing there in front of him at the moment. Probably each intricate step and slash, even.

Kendoh seemed to appreciate the danger, enough he glanced nervously towards Fimmress with wide, terrified eyes every so often. He came close to stammering as he addressed Lusiel’s questions, trying beyond belief to openly placate any upset Lusiel might continue feeling.

It wouldn't actually save him, Quinn thought. The only reason Kendoh’s heart continued beating was Lusiel's need of him, in fact. Once that necessity was used up … Lusiel finally sighed loudly, "Relax, Duke Kendo. Darth Baras doesn't want you dead. Yet." Lusiel's assurance was designed to calm the man. It didn't work. He continued to gibber and prattle.

Quinn used his datapad to record the information Duke Kendoh provided, marking the name of the woman he insisted had some connection to Jaesa Willsaam's parents as well as her location on the map. He glanced at Lusiel once he was sure they had enough useful information from the duke in order to proceed, noticed her watching him and saw her give him a brief nod of understanding when he put his datapad away.

"One last thing, my lady Sith. If you're able and you have the time, if you could have Lady Renata brought to the palace, here, I would be in your debt. She needs to be … questioned, of course." Duke Kendo said, his voice dropping low.

Lusiel shrugged back at him. "I’m not interested in pleasing you, Kendoh."

Kendoh nodded, “It was only a request, of course. Forgive me.” Lusiel had enough, finally, of the niceties she'd been forced to engage in, turned sharply on her heel and started walking from the room. The Duke called after her, sharing several more platitudes, but Lusiel ignored him utterly, only nodding to Fimress as she went.

She turned to Quinn as they emerged from the estate, looking up and into his eyes. She smiled with pleasure at being able to finally look _up_ at a man. "I was frustrated having such a tiny man pretend to be bigger than me. I had to bend my head to look at him, in fact, and my neck was becoming sore."

"I can see how that would be uncomfortable, my lord. Perhaps next time we can have him stand on a box." Quinn dramatically rubbed his jaw, apparently thinking. Lusiel choked back her laughter as Quinn added, “It would save the step of producing a burial box, too.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This remains one of my absolute favorite scenes in the SW story. So you can imagine my surprise when I struggled so hard to put it into words. I think I changed it like a dozen times. After hours of effort, this is the result. Bear in mind, I think Duke Kendo is one of the most despicable characters in the game, a pure weasel and I wanted to capture that sense, here. So I added a few nuances that aren't neccessarily included in the game itself. Hope I succeeded. Enjoy.


	34. Red Wine

Darth Baras was struggling with some not so small sense of regret. It was not a state he suffered normally, so he felt decidedly uncomfortable. But no one looking at him might have discerned the truth of his feelings, from behind the barrier of his face’s mask. Still, he now found himself regretting the destruction he had made of Overseer Tremel. The man's death at the time had been a rather satisfying experience, the removal of a particularly loathsome nuisance. So he was rid of an upstart overseer who supposed himself capable of driving Baras' course.

What Baras needed to know now, what he needed to understand was the best means of handicapping a potential threat, to hamper the increasing strength and power of Tremel’s own protégé. Before her determined course towards supremacy and dominance was even greater potentially than his own.

No, Baras refused to have anyone outstrip his own authority and voice. Most certainly not a brash, unrefined youth - a mere hoyden.

Which is why Baras now sat across the table set with a light repast looking at a meaningless nobody of a Korriban teacher known as Overseer Siloon. At least the man was human, Baras thought dryly. Stars forbid he be saddled with an alien throughout this tiresome and sure to be useless meeting. Siloon, however, was the only teacher Baras had managed to find who was guiding acolytes at Korriban when Lusiel was discovered, had in fact worked closely with Tremel at the time. Although Siloon insisted he himself had never actually trained the young Sith directly.

"No, my lord. Overseer Tremel took personal control of her training very early. I believe she was just barely eight at the time. He directed every stage of the process himself, quite deliberately. And even he admitted he wasn't sure the girl was ready when he called for her to be considered,” Siloon was emphatic. “From what I gather, most of his training with her focused on her martial skills. Which I'm told are quite spectacular."

"But why was Tremel so specific?" Baras challenged.

Siloon said, "He said she was capable of enormous strength, far beyond anything he'd seen before. But that it needed careful and methodical control, which is what he stressed in all her training. Control at all times, he said."

Baras leaned back in his chair, watching Siloon drank slowly from a glass of the finest wine. Red, of course. Baras had no patience for anyone who couldn't drink of the full depth a good red wine. "And what happens when she doesn't control her strength?" Baras pondered aloud, not really thinking Siloon would be able to answer him.

Siloon shrugged, concentrating more on his wine than on Baras really. That’s how easy and simple it was in the end, the answer just slipping from Siloon like it was water trickling along a creek bed. The overseer only chattered, half drunk, "She killed one of the Sith testing her force abilities. She was some tiny thing, barely reached waist high. But she managed to literally rip the man - a true Sith of some years - into shreds. There were pieces of him all around the room when we finally burst through the doors."

Baras stared at him, "How? What did she do?"

"She told us that something 'came out of her' when she became angry. Tremel supposed it was as if the Force itself, the darkest portion of it, actually invested itself in the girl. So she was during that time, the Force itself. And it was entirely rage, its purest form."

Baras was horrified. Such power was unheard of, more dangerous than anything he had ever known. Except for that of the Emperor himself, perhaps, and even _he_ might find it difficult to overcome. Should Baras find himself faced with such an incredible ability, it would surely destroy him. He felt himself shudder at the mere thought. It must not be allowed; Lusiel had to die immediately, he thought.

"I have never seen her do any such thing, however." Baras insisted.

"Of course not, my lord. I am not sure Tremel himself ever saw it, before she killed him. His training was specific, that she avoid fully manifesting such strength. It debilitates her, anyway. She's utterly helpless until she recovers from such an event and can be easily destroyed when in that state. Plus it takes enormous risk just to express it."

"Risk? What sort of risk?"

"She has to be _terrified_ , my lord. The ability seems to act as a form of self-defense against an enormous and incredible level of unmitigated fear, one that given time would surely destroy the girl's mind."

"You would have to know what scared her."

"But that's easy enough, my lord. It's why she killed the tester that day, after all. He did manage to scare her."

Baras leaned forward. "What did he do that scared her so badly?"

Siloon wet his lips, feeling his throat become suddenly dry. He glanced down at the pretty glass in his hand, blinked. "I'm suddenly not feeling very well, my lord."

"Tell me what I want to know, you fool. And I may give you the antidote."


	35. Tassels

Lusiel couldn't quite get past the man's absurd little hat. Every time he snarled some sort of insult at her, the tassel perched at the very center on the top of his hat swung around in a pure and neat circle. It reminded Lusiel of one of the toys her father gave her when she was a child, a fan of some kind made from paper that twirled in a colorful spinning motion when she held it up into the wind.  Definitely not so invigorating an exercise as defeating a madman determined on setting off a chain of explosives under House Thul's palace grounds.

But Lusiel did play one of her favorite games with Lord Cedric Killesa and his funny little hat, biting back any possible hint of amusement as he paced back and forth in front of her.

"I would rather see Alderaan blasted into space debris than given over to the Empire," Lord Killesa declared fervently, gesticulating wildly through the air. Lusiel coughed as the small tassel on top of his head made another rotation. He snarled again, "Look at you! You don't even have the honor – virtue! -- to fight me yourself. Instead you hide behind a carton of thermals. If you had a shred of decency, you'd settle this in a righteous duel, you against me."

This time Lusiel actually chuckled at his plainly obvious goading. She almost asked him, though, if he planned on taking his hat off before they dueled. But then she thought how much fun it would be to see how many rotations of that silly tassel she could make before the fight was over. So she waved Quinn towards her, and she stepped close to him, so that the curves of her armored breastplate only barely brushed his arm as he leaned down to hear her explain.

"Very well, my lord. I will endeavor to keep careful track of every rotation the tassel on his hat makes during the course of the battle. Would you be willing to make a wager on the outcome?" Quinn managed to keep from smiling. But his blue eyes twinkled at Lusiel. She tapped her chin with one pointed finger as she considered.

“So I bet I can get the tassel to spin a dozen times before he finally capitulates." Lusiel insisted.

Quinn scoffed, "Surely you can do better than that. I'll say you can make it spin twenty times before the end of the battle."

"No, no. I'll beat him far faster than twenty rotations. It can only be a dozen.” The group of Alderaanians tried interrupting, one of the men harrumphing loudly. But Lusiel waved a hand in his direction, gesturing for silence as she asked Quinn, “And what do you give me when I win?"

Quinn looked at her. "What is it you would want of me?"

"Oh! I thought that was purely obvious. Have I been too circumspect with you, Quinn?"

"Not at all, my lord." He looked at her, his eyes slowly darkening. "I only wish to specify what you'll want of this particular wager."

Lusiel gave the question serious thought. Behind her the treasonous Alderaanians shifted, their boots shuffling against the dirt of the floor. One of them grumbled, but she ignored them entirely and stared at Quinn with sudden seriousness. "When I win the wager, Quinn, I want you to kiss me."

Quinn nodded. "Agreed. However, when I win this wager, _you_ will kiss _me_."

"Done."

Lusiel almost danced over towards her opponent. She smiled merrily up into Killesa's bewildered expression and wraggled her fingers at him to open the fight. The song rose up inside of her, thrilling and piercing and excited, the beat and melody surging. Wildly pumping, like her blood in her veins and her heart pounding with anticipation. Her lightsaber twirled and danced, even as she did, her feet moving evenly over the dirt surface of the ruined tunnel chamber. She met the man's advance and spun around him, pushing her back against his so that he stumbled, before spinning once again to face him front-wise. Every motion was a twirl and a spin, and she counted.

At five, she butted his shoulder, spinning him around.

At eight, she stomped on his foot so that he twisted and went to a knee.

At ten, she whirled in a wide arc to Killesa's left, causing him to spin and stumble.

At twelve, she laid her lightsaber across his right hip, forcing him to rotate a final desperate time as he cried out in pain.

"I … concede." Killesa gasped, holding his side in obvious pain. "You have the better skill. Perhaps it is Alderaan's fate to fall to the Empire. I will tell my people they must find a way to live through these times." He looked towards his retainers, nodding, and they carefully backed from the chamber with their hands help up defensively. Lusiel was gratified he faced his death well, at least. Tassel or no tassel, in fact. She was happy enough with the fellow she made the killing blow a quick and easy thing, a single swipe that sent his hat tumbling soddenly to the ground. Jorad’s execution of the man would’ve been drawn and inglorious a thing; at least in this Killesa earned his precious honor.

She turned to look at Quinn, watching his every motion as he walked across the chamber to stand in front of her. He gazed at her earnestly, his eyes dark with want and desire, "You did win the wager, my lord."

"I did."

Quinn reached up with both hands, laying his fingers against both sides of Lusiel's face. He ran his fingers up and across her jaw, until the tips of his fingers swept over the rims of her ears. Lusiel gasped, felt Quinn pulling her face towards his own, until their lips just whispered against each other's and she could feel the puff of air as Quinn breathed softly against her mouth. Quinn gently butted her nose with his, ran his tongue lightly across her lips, coaxing, tempting.

Lusiel finally opened her lips, to meet his tongue as he swept forward, pressing his lips firmly against hers. Standing there, as her boots soaked in the blood of her enemy, Lusiel welcomed the wild, breathless movements of Quinn's mouth against her own. She luxuriated in every swipe of his tongue, every moan he gave into her mouth, every single sensation. And by the time it was done her entire body was quivering, hot.

They stayed that way for several long moments, their foreheads pressed against each other's, their mouths softly teasing. Until Quinn stepped away, and Lusiel watched him, watched his eyes, so dark they were like a moonlit night sky.

Lusiel smiled slowly. "Oh, we are so going to do that again."

"No doubt, my lord."


	36. Like a Krayt Dragon

Lusiel watched the fellow Lady Renata labelled Windredd charge at her, looking absurdly like that now very dead Krayt Dragon back on Tatooine. His face was red with exertion, his mouth was wide open as he shouted, and his nostrils were thickly flaring as he snorted. She wondered if he'd stomp his feet, too, so she watched. Sure enough, he pounded the floor with his two heavy booted feet as he drummed his way towards her.

All very tiresome, really. Which she blamed firmly on the ever so petite Lady Renata Alde. Who stood blithely behind the soon to be dead Windredd, and yawned with pretended boredom. Yawned! The blasted arrogant bitch was draped in brocade silks colored sky blue and never mind the way the color clashed with her dark skin, although orange paint circled her lips, too. It made the woman into a single, garish display.

Had Renata done anything in her own defense, anything at all … well, then Lusiel would have some small margin of respect for her. If she'd tossed a punch, thrown a bone, kicked Lusiel's shin – something. Instead, she threw Windredd at her, the poor idiot with his stumbling stammer and dim-looking gaze who kept calling the painted witch “Lady”. She wondered if Renata even once managed the briefest bit of training for the man.

The finest example of Alderaanian lady-hood, Lusiel thought.

She perhaps should have mentioned the Krayt Dragon beforehand, made the fight at least halfway fair a contest. Maybe Renata would have thought better of throwing Windredd away, at least. Maybe.

Then Lusiel neatly sidestepped Windredd's charge, just watched him patiently as he thundered past on his still-stomping feet. She swiped her lightsaber in a singing arc against Windredd's lower back, heard him bark out a nasty cry of pain. He spun around to face her again, roaring, then raised his chunky staff high over his large head. Lusiel slashed at him even faster than he could swing against her, though. She sank her blade deep into his belly then, and saw him blink at her owlishly. He groaned painfully when she yanked her lightsaber free and stepped smoothly back from his falling body.

"Lady … I …sorry …" Windredd whimpered his dying words. It was actually pitiful. Lusiel stood over his crumpled form for several seconds, thoughtful. Windredd was weak, failed. No one of her own overseers would have suffered the man in the simplest field. They would have mercifully struck him down before his life’s end was only good for mocking. Killing him now was as close to mercy as she herself could manage, though. Lusiel was disgusted with the entire debacle. Quinn stepped closer and she mumbled to him, "Whatever brute we end up adding to the crew will be smarter than this one, do you understand? Anyone who follows me will understand what I ask of them, every time."

Quinn nodded. "I'll make a note of it, my lord."

Sudden and loud bawling erupted in the room. Renata flung herself down onto the floor, where she begged for mercy in sobbing appeals. For her own self, and only now that Windredd was destroyed. Lusiel watched her in stunned silence for several moments. The spectacle forced Lusiel to consider what value Alderaan truly offered the Empire, only because such a weak people could hinder far more than they'd benefit.

"Enough. Shut up. I have no interest in your fate, just tell me what I need to know," Lusiel broke through the woman's weeping.

Renata glanced up from her position on the floor. The Sith woman was standing so solidly, so angrily, there in the middle of the room. She'd at least stepped over Windredd's corpse, so that her boots obscured the thing from Renata's gaze. All she knew, though, was the Sith standing there was the most horrible vision she'd ever taken in. The incongruity of her wickedness and her beauty confounded Renata, in fact. She simply couldn't imagine evil being so beautiful, and yet here it was – a glorious vision of threat, looming over her.

And that was when Duke Kendoh's Sith entourage marched into the room and ringed the horrible woman who'd killed Windredd. Because of course Kendoh was playing his same, tired game; sending the Sith after a whim of his, on some goose chase of a ploy he thought might win him the prize. Damn him, with his beady little eyes that sized her up whenever he saw her, watching her like she was something to nibble on and consume. Renata shuddered, wailing spectacularly as she thought of him touching her, using her. She couldn't let it happen, she just couldn't! Oh, damn you, Windredd, she thought. He only should have succeeded!

"Please, please, Lady Sith! Don't let them take me to the Duke! Anything, I'll tell you anything you want to know," Renata began crying again. "I do know who Jaesa Willsaam worked for! Geselle! Geselle Organa! She leads troops for House Organa … please!"

"Really? And where would I find this Geselle Organa?" Lusiel asked.

"Her headquarters are somewhere on the front lines."

Fimmress reached down to grasp Renata’s upper arm, yanking her upright and against his own self. But he didn’t look at her, only gazed questioningly towards Lusiel. "What would you have done with this woman, my lord?”

Lusiel crossed her arms over her chest, her head bent sideways as she looked at the other Sith. Behind her, Quinn shifted his frame and stepped closer. The undercurrent of Sith politics permeated the room, each one of the Force-strong warriors standing breathless and ready and all of them ignoring the gasping pleas that continued dripping from Renata’s painted mouth. Lusiel stared at Fimmress, "I do not bear such a title."

Fimmress lifted his beefy chin up. “Not yet. I only hope you remember the steps you took to achieve it and the ones who helped along the way. When the time comes.”

“We will see.” Lusiel breathed in slowly, glanced at Renata’s bent frame where she huddled into Fimmress’ side, “But in the meantime, I don’t give a damn what happens to her. Only please take her away so I don’t have to listen to her anymore.”

Renata burst into wild tears once again, sobbing, "I thought by telling you what I know, you'd show mercy!"

Lusiel looked down at Windredd's dead body. "Your protectors don't seem to fare very well, Lady Renata. And I'm not the idiot this fellow was." Lusiel toed the body negligently. She could still hear Renata's sobs long after the woman was dragged from the room.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So if you haven't guessed already, my Warrior is VERY darkside. For those familiar enough with D&D terminology, I consider my darkside characters as more Lawful Evil, rather. They do have strong, decided and core rules by which they live and decide, I mean. But they're ruthless and cruel and vicious in achieving those ends, is all.


	37. Politic Maneuvers

"I am beside myself with appreciation for your delivering Lady Renata to me. She will prove most … useful." Duke Kendoh said with an air of unctuous contentment. Lusiel smiled and hummed at him with prettified graciousness.

The Duke continued to assume Lusiel was disposed towards affectionate, courtly attitudes, as every other woman of his sorry acquaintance had been. As if Lusiel was yet another Renata, to be prodded and maneuvered as Kendoh saw fit, hah! It suited her to leave him floundering in the miscalculation. Given enough rope, Kendoh would only hang himself in the end. So Lusiel tossed him another length of the thing and let him back further into a corner. Like a rat. With no big kitties around to save him.

She nodded in slightest respect towards Fimress, standing behind Duke Kendo, his suffered patience obvious.

And in the meantime she'd make use of Kendo as the tool he really was.

With that in mind, Lusiel smiled lightly, "Anything for House Thul." She sensed Quinn’s approval behind her. Quinn far better understood her, anyway. He'd given her several valuable suggestions as they'd returned to Kendoh's estate. Lusiel enjoyed putting his advice to work. It was such an easy way to please her captain. Hey, another justification for restraining her desire to break Kendoh's face.

That thought actually helped her remain smiling as Duke Kendoh continued talking.

"Gesselle Oranna leads the Organna war effort against House Ulgo. Her headquarters is protected by an impenetrable force field. No firepower can breach it." Duke Kendoh pondered. "Our task, then, is to find a way around her defense … wait … yes! We can cut the power to the force field! I know which generator Geselle must be using. Once the force field is down you can just walk into the general's headquarters. It's perfect!"

Quinn stepped forward. "Do you have schematics that describe the generator and its defenses? We must ensure it doesn't disrupt the power to Thul resources." He tapped against the datapad that seemed permanently affixed to his fingers, barely glancing at Kendoh as he worked.

Duke Kendo scowled at him. "I'm not accustomed to _servants_ who interrupt their betters with mere opinions. I'd already considered such concerns, anyway." Quinn looked up, his blue eyes sullen with disapproval. But he only nodded tightly before stepping further behind Lusiel.

Lusiel leaned her weight onto one hip and crossed her arms nearby her waist. "Well. What is it you’re thinking, Duke Kendoh." She listened attentively to Kendoh's assurances about power distribution on Alderaan, nodding intermittently as he proceeded. When he stopped to stare at her attentively, Lusiel looked behind her pointedly. "Captain. Will the Duke’s proposal succeed, or not?"

Kendoh started, gaping wide-eyed towards Quinn suddenly. Fimmress shifted his stance, smiling slightly as the Duke tensed. She did it so easily, threatened with barely a nod, admonished without saying a word. Praised, with only a glance. There was a deadly strength to Lusiel’s every glance, her most utter breath. She was glorious a Sith.

"It's sound, my lord. If the force field operates on an emergency power tap, when the system transfers to backup sources, the tap will have to be reengaged." Quinn bowed his head slightly towards Lusiel.

Duke Kendo smiled broadly. "See? Your man obviously knows his stuff." He turned and waved at Fimmress, ordering the Sith to retrieve the necessary items for Lusiel's task. Fimmress did not bother hiding his scowl. Lusiel was more amused Kendoh believed she'd rely on anything he provided her, however. She glanced at Quinn, saw him dip his head at her. She knew her captain's capabilities, that he could create a deadly explosive without any doubtful assistance from the Duke. But Lusiel took the materials Fimress handed her, even thanked the duke.

Then she insisted, "The schematics, too."

"Oh. Erhm … Of course. Fimmress? Get the schematics for our friend, here, would you?" Duke Kendoh nodded. Lusiel bit her lip as Fimmress left sullenly to retrieve the schematics. She inclined her head as he handed them to her. Duke Kendo frowned as Lusiel easily passed the schematics along to her captain. The fellow seemed to be given far greater esteem than a mere servant was due. He watched as the Imperial followed Lusiel out of the room, thoughtful.

He asked, as an aside to Fimress, "Is it common for Sith to employ Imperial officers like that?"

Fimmress frowned at Kendoh. "No one tells the Sith what to do. The man is hers as long as she wants him."

Duke Kendoh was startled. "Wants him? Are they lovers then?"

"I would not presume to know the answer to that question, my lord. But she obviously values his skills and capabilities. It speaks highly of his potential."

Duke Kendoh looked at Fimmress thoughtfully. Then he mumbled to himself, nodding, "They're lovers."


	38. Dinner and a Show

Quinn sat forward, his head bent down as he studied the schematics that described the power generator Lusiel needed to destroy to reach the Organa woman. It was blatantly obvious to him, at least, what ploy Kendoh was using in choosing this particular site. He already anticipated the additional locations they would need to target before the shields covering the units were truly destroyed, anyway. Lusiel nodded at him from where she sat across the table, “Another length of rope drapes Kendoh’s neck.”

Quinn glanced at her, curious, “Should we warn them, however?”

Lusiel frowned as she looked down at her plate, prodding the glistening stew of kebroot Quinn insisted she finish eating with a delicate fork. And really. Why was everything on Alderaan made so _pretty_ , she wondered. The food, the clothes, the people … “I have no interest in Kendoh’s petty disputes with his cousins. Let him savor his success, for now. My master will direct me accordingly.” Such dainty attitudes were too simply disappointed in the long run, she thought.

Quinn harrumphed, almost under his breath as he eyed her plate. Lusiel bit back her smile before spearing another bite with her oh-so-pretty fork. She was still over-prone to skipping meals, basically forgot to eat whenever she was focused on some given task or effort. Lusiel tolerated Quinn’s conscious determination to guide her eating habits, so long as he accepted her prodding admonishments in regards his sleeping. The arrangement proved successful, at least.

They both glanced up when someone suddenly stumbled into the side of the table, there in the very same café where poor Chrimar Noven never ventured again.

Lusiel called that incentive enough to visit the place when Quinn declared he was hungry, so she yanked him inside. Well since they were there anyway, Lusiel might as well eat something as well, he said. She'd looked surprised and remarked, "Oh, yes, I _am_ hungry." Quinn had carefully refrained from smiling as they proceeded to eat a rather hearty meal of nerf-beef on sticks, slathered in delicate dipping sauce, over flatbread, and with a side of stewed kebroot.

So when a stranger bumped into their table, Quinn scrambled to grab against his empty plate before it tumbled to the floor and shattered. He gripped the edge of the plate and slanted a glance at Lusiel, who’s fork was holding her meal in place on top of the table. The clumsy oaf who’d bumped them stammered an apology, "Oh, my, I'm so so sorry, caught my foot on that step there. And why'd they go and put a step right there in the middle of the floor, I say. So sorry!"

Quinn stiffened angrily as he heard him, recognized the voice immediately. And why not, it was a voice he had considered through countless recorded lines of communication, worked tirelessly to discover and capture the agent. That he was there, right there and now on Alderaan, was not likely any sort of coincidence. Whatever glance at Quinn’s datapad he hoped to glean from bumbling into their table would not win him any accolades from the SIS.

Quinn's hand shot out and seized hold of the man's shoulder. "Don't move, Voloren."

"What? Who're you talking about? That's not my name! Let me go! Someone make this madman let me go!" The human man, dressed in standard garb traditional to Alderaan, twisted in Quinn's hold. But the Imperial officer doggedly maintained his grip. Quinn actually smiled; Lusiel thought he looked quite as happy as a cat who swallows a tasty bird in its grasp.

The patrons of the café were startled. Several people gasped and cried out, “Not again! Another one!” The café’s proprietors shot them hard glances and angry looks, but Lusiel only ignored them as she continued eating. Several people just broke and ran out of the place, determined to hide from anything involving Imperial business. Quinn only hoped none of the miscreants running away worked with the foolish agent currently squirming and shouting against his grasp.

Armored figures from one of the local security forces burst through the doors. The guards eyed Quinn and his prize with narrowed eyes, demanding, "What's going on here?"

The agent tried yanking himself free again. "This … this Imperial is insane! He keeps calling me by a strange name I've never heard and won't let me go!"

Quinn shook him, hard enough his teeth rattled against the back of his mouth. "Shut up! You guards, leave! This man is being taken into Imperial custody. He is no concern of yours."

"'Fraid we can't do that, Mr. Imperial Sir. This fellow is a citizen of Alderaan, not an Imperial, and we'll be taking him from your completely unkind hold right now." The guards strutted closer, their hands reaching out towards Quinn’s prisoner when a Sith accent suddenly interrupted.

"Do not make me put down my fork and deal with you idiots. It’s a pretty fork. So is the food. I’d like to finish it." Everyone froze as Lusiel finally spoke, addressing the guards. Quinn kept his attention focused on the agent, who only kept squirming from outright panic. But the guards spun their heads around to look at her, and both of the men gulped as they took in her armor and weapon. That she was blithely continuing to eat her meal just struck them as particularly frightening for some reason. But there she reclined, finely munching on stewed kebroot even as the entire café became so cold and quiet.

"You're uh … Sith? Right?"

Lusiel swallowed another bite, balefully staring at the guards.

"Err … I'm sure you understand we need to take this fellow off for uh … questioning."

Lusiel shook her head, not glancing towards Quinn as she replied. "The man is in custody already, rather. He will remain there until he is properly questioned by Imperial authorities. You are not needed here, he is no concern of yours. Now leave."

"But this Imperial, here, has no right … !"

Lusiel glared at them, her eyes so dark they looked like pools of black, molten rock. "Are you going to continue disturbing my meal right now? It disturbs my captain when I fail to finish my meals, mind you. I don’t like it when he is upset."

"Oh.” Both the guards looked at each other, confused. “Well. No, my lord. I guess not."

The man Quinn had called Voloren renewed his squirming, wriggling struggles against Quinn's hold once it was clear the guards would not truly help him. Quinn held him tight as he shouted at the guards’ backs, "Come back, you can't leave me here! I'm Alderaanian! Damn you, you fools!"

"Shut up, Voloren." Quinn gestured with his free hand that Lusiel continue eating, "My lord, you're nearly done with your food."

Lusiel smirked at him as she picked up a piece of flatbread and continued chewing. They waited, patiently. It really wasn't long before a Chiss approached the small group, a sniper rifle slung over his shoulder. The man eyed the entire scene -- all the silent, watching patrons in the café and the Sith wiping the crumbs from her lips, the agitated fellow in fancy robes held up by the Imperial officer gripping a blaster in one hand. His red eyes hardened tellingly as he demanded, "I assume this fellow needs to be questioned. Explain, briefly."

Quinn nodded at the Chiss. "I hunted this figure several years ago. I had him cornered at one point. But I was forced to give up my pursuit when I was recalled. I've continued the pursuit during my free times ever since. He's called Voloren, and he works with the SIS."

The Chiss turned to Lusiel, his big red eyes seeming to stare, almost, into nothingness. Lusiel was direct and she never even glanced at Voloren when she told the Chiss, "If my captain says this man is an SIS agent, then he is. Take him."

It was enough. No one denied a Sith. The Chiss lifted his chin, "Of course, my lord. We'll question him at length. Captain, please ensure all information you have on the agent is transferred to Imperial Intelligence at once."

The man glared at them all, jerking one last time. "You'll not get away with this."

Lusiel watched the Chiss drag the protesting human away, as she spooned the very last bit of her food into her mouth. Then she smiled, "Ah, Quinn! Food and a show! How thrilling!"

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Voloren is introduced during ordinary conversations with Malavai Quinn through the course of the Sith Warrior story. Quinn explains that Voloren only escaped him during the Battle of Drukenwell due to the gross incompetence of his superior, Moff Broysc, and indicates he has continued hunting the man ever since.


	39. Follow Me

Lusiel found Quinn buried deep in the ship's hold, as if the skin of the ship itself might offer some kind of protection should the materials he was handling fail and explode unexpectedly. Vette was standing next to him in front of the long length of trade table, where they typically plotted various armors and pieces using the pieces they scavenged in the field. Tools were scattered across the surface, in a veritable mess that could only be the product of Vette’s efforts, actually. Quinn would more likely place each item in its own precious, designated spot than to toss it haphazardly onto the tabletop.

The two of them were carefully manipulating a spherical gadget Quinn had tucked into a gravity-holder, as Vette slowly inserted explosives material into the thing’s innards. Quinn interspersed the entire process with slow and weighted commands, which Vette only responded to with weary admonishments he shut up.

Lusiel leaned against the frame of the door leading into the space, choking back laughter as they went at it:

"You're holding the tongs too tightly, loosen your grip."

"If you don't stop telling me what to do I'm going to drop this bomb crap right on your damn foot!"

"But then you would have to complete this task on your own, with me in the medical bay."

"Nerf-poo. You'd hobble all the way down here on a real-live prosthetic foot just to finish the thing."

"Vette…"

"I said to shut … up!"

Lusiel held a slim hand up to her mouth, to hold onto the aching giggles she could feel fighting for release. Actually, she feared making any sounds that startled them into making a mistake or mishandling the device and blowing the lot of them sky high. There were some particular parts of Quinn she wanted to put her hands onto, rather. Rather than vaporized. Although she reminded herself, that it wasn’t just his parts she really wanted. She bent her head sideways, watching them with wide eyes as she thought over all the various aspects of her captain that she _wanted_.

So she waited patiently as Quinn and Vette finished assembling the bomb. To their own credit, as they were both concentrating so carefully on the task, neither of her people noticed her standing there.

"Why don't you do something more helpful, Vette? Did you gather all those biochemical agents we needed for additional kolto dispensers?"

"Yes, days ago. Do you want me to scratch your eyes out with these tongs?"

"You do realize that, as a slave, you can be punished severely for behaving disrespectfully to a superior, don't you?"

"You would know all about disrespecting a superior. Least that's what the messages from Moff Broysc keep saying."

"Moff Broysc is an ass."

"So are you!"

Lusiel lost the game at that point, and both Quinn and Vette looked around as she suddenly began laughing. The looks on their faces sent her into further peals of laughter, too. Their combined exasperation was so incredibly funny, anyway. Lusiel was enchanted.

"Vette has failed utterly to appreciate the proper nuances of behavior for her station, my lord." Quinn explained. His pale skin was flushed pink from embarrassment.

"Oh no, you so did not just say that!” Vette’s lekku literally trembled with angry agitation, “Oh, I know what it means to be a slave, trust me. I simply choose not to act like one of those bootlicking slaves you see far too commonly chasing behind you Empire-type schizos! Nok Drayen always insisted if you act like a slave then a slave's all you'd ever be." Vette thumbed in Lusiel’s direction, "And she doesn't want a slave like that, anyway."

"Nok Drayen was a criminal!"

"But he still freed me!"

"Which was a criminal offense!"

"He gave me the closest thing to a family I'd had since my mother and sister were sold, though!"

"And where is he now?"

"Dead! It’s the only damn reason I'm stuck with you, now!"

Lusiel held up a small hand, waving dramatically as if calling for a truce. If she’d had a small white cloth, she would have waved it through the air. "I would appreciate being included if we're going to start establishing family dynamics, here."

"Oh, no, my lord, sorry. I may be the child in this equation but Quinn is _not_ going to be anything close to dad for me."

And that's when Lusiel started laughing herself silly once again. Because both Vette and Quinn appeared equally ill as they regarded each other right then. "Go along, Vette. I'm sure Toovee needs help … doing whatever it is he does around here."  Lusiel turned to Quinn after the Twi'lek had gone, watching as he packed up the charges they had completed into careful containers. She was still smiling as she watched the turns and bends of his body while he finished his work, "You know, Quinn. I do believe you would make an ideal father."

Quinn scoffed, shifting her a sideways glance as he sealed the last container shut. He began moving the small boxes into a pack he could easily carry along with them into the field. "I hardly had a very good teacher of such skills, my lord. My own father never proved worthy of the title, is the kindest thing I could say of him."

"Then you know what makes for failure. That's half the battle."

Quinn looked over at Lusiel, frowning thoughtfully. "I have no force abilities. My appeal is hardly benefited by such a lacking." She was pleased, that he had offered the same questions his time and consideration, enough to judge his own worth aside her. Even if he came to so much a different conclusion. Now she shrugged lightly enough.

"Don't sell yourself short, captain. Your lineage is actually quite impressive."

"You've looked into it, then?"

Lusiel chuckled, "You looked into _mine_ , did you not?"

"Yes, but …" Quinn shook his head, utterly bewildered. Like there was one of those absurd rooms in his mind suddenly sprouted a new doorway that she insisted was always there, if only he had seen it. He blinked slowly, "What is it we're actually talking about, my lord?"

Lusiel laughed again. Her dark eyes twinkled with willful desire. As if she had already decided and he was only slowly catching up to her methodical course. He would follow her along, because she would not stop. It was the proper way of doing things, after all. "Oh, Quinn. You really do amuse me sometimes."


	40. Gliding of the Thranta

Lusiel regarded their transportation with adulterated enthusiasm. Not that anyone watching might have understood so much. Her public mien was staid, solidly Sith and terrifying to anyone who happened to catch sight of them. But Lusiel was only focused the animal she needed to mount, that would carry them through the air to some distant location.

Of course the _animals_ on Alderaan were pretty, she thought, amused.

The thing was immense; its huge bulbous nose was rounded into a snout shape while its long pale gray body extended in a long massive line towards its thick, winding tail. Tremendous wings extended from both of its sides, the skin on them waving gently against the updraft of air. The beast emitted intermittent moaning sounds that echoed through the surrounding forest. It looked like a giant sea creature, except it glided through the air. It was absolutely beautiful.

Quinn was carefully questioning the creature's handlers on its training and care. Lusiel watched him, admiring the turn of his dark head as he gestured imperiously towards the caretakers of these animals. She wondered if she might convince him to keep the beast once they reached their destination. Although she was doubtful they'd manage to successfully remove the animal from Alderaan. Certainly not on her ship, anyway. And it would probably die quickly in some other environment, too.

Lusiel eyed the creature when it chortled suddenly. Perhaps snatching the animal from Alderaan would prove worthwhile, regardless of the actual effort. Flying the thing over Kaas City would be an invigorating exercise, at least. She smiled slightly at the thought, just as Quinn approached her.

"My lord, they're prepared to seat us on the animal's back." Quinn pointed towards the saddle perched on the middle of the creature's huge back. "It's trained to carry us towards a specific location, which is actually several kilometers from where we are headed. We'll have to speeder the rest of the way."

Lusiel nodded, stepping forward to where the handler was holding out his hand. Quinn grumbled as he brushed aside the man's offered assistance, though. He wrapped his hands around Lusiel’s trim waist, lifting her into the air so she could hoist her legs over the back of the flying animal. Lusiel squirmed a bit until her bottom was comfortably situated in the saddle, her legs falling to either side, and held on tightly as Quinn leapt smoothly into place behind her.

Which vastly and suddenly improved the entire experience, Lusiel decided. Quinn's legs were draped just behind her own, his knees pressing into the backs of her thighs. She felt his hips settle into place, actually cradling her buttocks. His groin was hot against the cleft of her rear. She heard him gasp, chuckled slightly as she glanced back at him over her shoulder. "Very comfortable. Don’t you agree, Quinn?"

Lusiel waved at the handlers, watching as they released the ties which kept the animal tethered in place. Then the ground began receding, as a rush of wind rose up all around them under the gentle, slow waving of the beast’s giant wings. They rose high into the air, high. Lusiel cried out with excitement, allowing herself an open sign of pleasure and excitement. If only for a moment, she even waved her hands up into the air so that back bowed and her bottom rubbed against Quinn’s groin and belly.

Quinn reached forward to grasp the side of the saddle on either side of Lusiel's waist, giving him a better grip so he didn't end up sliding off the tail of the animal. It also had him pressing his broad chest against the warm expanse of her back, curling her forward slightly so his upper arms nudged the outer curves of Lusiel's breasts. She was utterly delighted. She began rocking in her seat, rubbing her backside against his groin. With deliberate and completely predictable results.

Quinn lowered his head until his mouth touched the outer shell of Lusiel's ear, and said, "We should endeavor to allocate one of these beasts for your own specific use whenever you might like, my lord." He pressed back against her, rubbed his growing hardness into the curves of Lusiel's rear quite purposefully. His stomach warmed with delight when Lusiel tossed her head back against his shoulder to moan loudly.

"Stars, yes!"


	41. The Organna General

Lusiel regarded the substantial steel door barring her way to the military woman she was intent on reaching. Geselle Organna – who probably anticipated so much more value of her own self, than Lusiel actually deemed. She concentrated on her breaths, focused on gathering again her own strength and power as she gently waved her lightsaber in smooth arcs at her side. Just to hear the music of its song, actually. This mere door would not stop her. She was Sith!

Lusiel gestured Quinn back from her as she lifted the blade of her saber high up to thrust through the door that stretched over her head. And she cut in a solid circling line. The door became molten in its frame, glowing bright yellow as the metal dissolved. Until the catch finally gave way and the entire circling shape she had carved fell forward into the room on the other side, with a loud clanging noise peeling through the air. Lusiel smiled grimly as she caught the cries and excited voices of the general’s officers, just before she stepped through the hot metal circle through the door, and Quinn murmured some approving sound from behind her. Glorious.

There were two soldiers standing there, both of them shouting wildly. They were the last two guards that stood between her and the closed door opposite the one she’d carved a path through, the only ones left who were determined to oppose her. They tried, they even raised up weapons as they spun around to face her. The first one -- Lusiel reached out with the Force to fling him up and through the air, hard enough the sound of his bones breaking filled the confined space. The other soldier hoped to take some advantage from Lusiel’s preoccupation with his friend’s bones breaking.

Stupid, really. Lusiel barely glanced from the dying one wilting down onto the floor, before she lifted the man up and held him solidly hard against the wall. Quinn stepped closer to her as the soldier grunted, his heels kicking roughly into the wall as he grabbed his throat to try loosening Lusiel’s invisible hold on the soft flesh, there. The man gasped, gasped, but only lost his last breaths before Lusiel finally dropped his corpse back onto the floor.

It wasn’t an overly pleasant sight, but Quinn merely ambled towards the two dead men. Just long enough to verify their deaths, that they wouldn’t follow behind them as they went through the last, brief door to find the Organna woman. Lusiel didn’t even bother noting them that much, rather. She just stepped over their dead bodies to reach the door, which she almost idly pushed open.

The officers were still arguing. Why didn’t they flee, Lusiel wondered. Surely a general would have a bolt-hole of some sort. But they only ringed a large blocky-looking table, pointing at various maps and devices scattered over the surface in front of them. "Whatever’s coming this way, it’s carving through every one of our defenses. It has to be a small, focused team of some sort! We have to respond, do something," one fellow said, his bald head nodding emphatically.

"Bollocks! As long as the force field’s down – and gods, they took out no less than three generators simultaneously to accomplish that particular feat! -- but until my technicians get the field reset, we’re sitting ducks here!" That came from a rather round looking officer, actually. Lusiel wondered what kind of army life provided leisure enough a soldier could become so fat.

"The one explosion managed to take out several members of House Thul, in fact. Mark my words, this is Ulgo making a move. I’d stake my life on it," Baldie asserted. Lusiel almost smiled, to hear Kendoh’s audacity confirmed. Another misstep on the fool’s part, she thought. His destruction would come swift and real, and she savored the thought for some small second of time.

Then Lusiel interrupted, stepping boldy into the room as she declared, "I’ll take that bet, actually. Because House Ulgo has nothing on a Sith, and _I_ care nothing at all over silly assassinations of absurd Thuls. I'm here for information on Jaesa Willsaam's family, rather."

Surprisingly, it was the fat one who managed to raise a weapon in defense of his general. Lusiel would have applauded his verve, at least. But she quickly snatched his blaster in a Force grip, motioned negligently so that the weapon sailed into a nearby console and shattered the machine in a brilliant arc of sparks and sizzling noise. Quinn stepped into the room then, idling against the wall nearby the door as he gripped his own blaster and simultaneously thumbed a recording device to record the events in the room.

One of the men leaped forward suddenly. Youngish-looking, with sand-colored hair and pale blue eyes set above a smooth, attractive jaw. Pretty, handsome – take your pick, because Lusiel was unimpressed by his bold protectiveness. It was certainly no barrier, even if he was yelling aloud, insisting, “Gesselle, get behind me. Quick!” That he called the woman by her given name betrayed the intimacy he shared with the general. But Gesselle herself only waved him away.

Gesselle Organa refused to cower behind her lover. Admirable enough, Lusiel thought as she eyed the woman’s blonde hair cropped short against the nape of her neck, the chin she thrust out pugnaciously courageous in the face of a real Sith, and the pressed lips she presented before widening her stance so bravely. Gesselle ordered her officers, emphatically, "None of you panic, damn it. I'll handle this." Gesselle Organa squared off, facing Lusiel adamantly. "You are a Sith, then. And you did all this, just to discuss my former handmaiden? Please tell me, is every Sith so bloodthirsty as you?"

Lusiel shrugged. As if the woman could actually succeed in insulting her, anyway. Calling the Sith bloodthirsty was like calling Hoth cold! "Do not bother with pleasantries, actually. I have little time to waste here. I have business to attend with some other worm of a man, actually. Now … Tell me where the Willsaam girl’s family is."

"Well. You’re definitely single-minded, at least," Gesselle Organna responded. But she frowned. Lusiel recognized the motions of a woman preparing to make a deal, and sighed.   “You’ve managed to decimate my forces outside. They were supposed to secure a part of my front, which will fall in on itself now. I have to scramble for reinforcements as it is! But I do have information you need … Perhaps my help, in exchange for time?"

Lusiel frowned darkly. Gesselle Organna caught sight of the officer who followed the Sith, saw him shaking his head in a sort of wry sympathy. Gesselle bit back the twinge of concern that etched her spine with alarm, squared her shoulders. She kept thinking -- she only needed to be rid of this monstrous woman, of her insanity, and then she could fix the damage. It was a simple enough motion, hardly challenging for the … _creature_ who’d dealt so much devastation in one single day. She refused to think of the Sith as human even, only wanted her gone.

Gesselle underestimated Lusiel's determination to not be coerced into acting according to anyone’s whims aside from her own, though. No Alderaanian could be allowed to doubt their proper place was inferior to the power of a Sith, and Lusiel would not be manipulated. Not today, and never by _this_ woman. Lusiel’s pert nose wrinkled, "You’ve already recognized my own bloody intention. What makes you think I care of anything regards your pitiful battle lines? No, tell me what I want to know, or I'll kill each of your men. Right here in front of you, one by one.”

Gesselle threw her shoulders back, and sneered at Lusiel. Lusiel thought of the recent game of dejaril she played dejarik with her brother, thought of Khy’s pointed consideration of the board, “ _A good bluff depends on your opponent failing to recognize it for what it is, rather. Only declare an action that you’re truly prepared to make, not anything less._ ” Now, Lusiel didn’t fail to recognize Gesselle’s bluff. Poor, frustrated general, Lusiel thought with amusement. The little gambit wouldn’t work, here.

Gesselle waved her hand, _pretending_ to be unconcerned, "Go ahead. There are bigger concerns, here, and Kan'grell, Prinn and Blenks knew the risks of serving me. Killing them will only be wasted effort on your part"

Lusiel smiled darkly, “Are you looking forward to playing eenie-meenie-minie-moe with your men, then?” Lusiel lifted a single finger into the air, waved it back and forth, “Kan’grell … Prinn … Or … Blenks!” She curled her fingers into a hard fist, her dark brown eyes narrowing on the general’s young lover with the purring voice. The Force jerked, like a band that tightened the very air around them. Like a snap, it wound itself around the young officer’s neck and his entire body bent backwards under the strength of that terrible hold on his neck. Tighter, tighter, Lusiel didn’t even quiver as she held his life under the power of her hand. Like a gnat slowly crushed under the press of a single swat, she thought.

It was Gesselle who shook and trembled. “It won’t work, Sith. I’m not so simply … not so easily broken.” Lusiel slanted her a dark glance, her smile curving even more with the darkest promise. She would not stop, she would kill him. Gesselle whitened even more, until she looked nearly ghost-like standing there. When Blenks finally lost his ability to stand and bent over onto the floor to gasp out some more breaths through his now-purple lips, Gesselle reached for him desperately. “No! Not him, anyone else! Kill me, even. But leave him alone!”

“Tell me what I want to know!”

Gesselle swallowed, her hands gripping her lover’s shoulders as he writhed against the floor. “Her family … They’re servants in House Organna still, stationed in the central tower! Here, take this. It’s a pass key that will give you access into their chamber. Just stop this! Stop!” Lusiel dropped her hand, so that Blenks tumbled backwards. His muscles were spent as he jerked deep breaths into his lungs, desperately.

Lusiel focused on Gesselle herself then, "He'll live, Gesselle. But not you. I don't tolerate those who think to manipulate me." Gesselle gasped, even as the crimson promise of Lusiel’s blade sliced through the pale blue plates of armor that covered her soft belly. The woman snarled out one last time, glaring at Lusiel, "I should've known." The other officers shouted, their hands reaching out as if to stop her. But Lusiel was already moving. The melody was bitter and wild, rising up over the entire room as Lusiel spun and danced, her saber swinging through the bodies of Kan’grell and Prinn.

Gesselle lay on the floor, moaning as her officers screamed out shrilly in pain and final, blasted waves of fear. The Sith’s boots made a treading motion against the floor as she circled the dying men. Gesselle watched through slowly dying eyes as the woman went out through the door, her dark-haired man following her. She realized blearily that she never heard the man speak a single word. Then it was so quiet, except for Blenks' harsh breaths as he fought to recover.

That’s how Gesselle died, listening to the man that she loved screaming in grieving agony over her shattered body there on the floor.

* * *

 Lusiel halted her STAP speeder against the cliffside road that overlooked the Imperial transport, far below. She breathed in steady breaths, her head tossed back as she watched the clouds moving overhead, listened to the cold wind moving through the trees and the warbling of the flying beasts far-off in the distance. She needed this moment, this soft moment of peace to gather herself once more.

She looked over at Quinn, perched quietly on his own STAP. He had obviously sensed her disquiet. But he didn’t interfere, only stayed silent as they moved away from the Organna bunker. She knew he was aware of her every motion, every expression, that he waited for her before anything else. Lusiel very nearly smiled as she played her game, knew it would not be long before he finally broke down and asked her something. Probably something about her eating habits, she supposed. But in the meantime he tapped against the face of a datapad, recording whatever his thoughts were in regards their most recent adventure.

But that only made her think of the Organna woman all over again.

Lusiel was not so much a fool as Gesselle Organna, damn it. No. Eventually there would be those who would see, would truly discern how much affection she truly felt for Malavai Quinn. They would use it, if they could find the means.

They would _hurt_ him.

Lusiel frowned darkly, scowled even. Obviously enough, that Quinn shifted in his seat on top of the STAP he was riding. She looked away from him, scanned the far reaches of the mountain range in the distance. To hide from Quinn’s knowing gaze, at least. Besides, Alderaan really was the prettiest world she had ever visited, complete with the most majestic landscapes. A summer home in this region of the planet would prove pleasing to her every sense. And so she breathed slowly all over again.

No. Lusiel could never allow herself to be in the same position as the oh-so-foolish General Gesselle Organna. Her mind swarmed with possibilities – all the possible plans and strategies, concerns over directions threats would come at her from, the most likely scenarios, and, of course, how best to mitigate them. She could perhaps keep Quinn close to her all the time, where her own saber might be defense enough. But that was unlikely a chance, not when Quinn was obliged to serve the Empire in ways and means that would carry him away from her often enough, like her brother, too.

Khyriel. She most definitely needed to discuss the issue with him, knew it was imperative Khy understood Quinn’s value. If anything were to happen to her … Lusiel sighed. She needed to find some way to be close to Quinn even when she wasn’t, needed to be able to respond to him should something, anything threaten him.

Lusiel clenched her fists tightly, remembering her mother’s voice suddenly, the hissing words of a madwoman imploring her to destroy the little brother she'd learned to adore, “ _He’s so useless, not even a smidge of Force ability to make us better, stronger. Your father will think it’s an accident, dearling_ …” Bitch! I'm glad you're dead!  Lusiel breathed in deeply, vowing quietly to herself all over again.

Because she could not fail to protect _either_ of these men she loved.


	42. Falling into the Dark

They were prepared, of course. Lucky Blenks, who didn’t die back in the bunker. He must have sent a message ahead of them, warned the Organna guards of her approach.

It barely slowed her progress, although the fights were intense as they plodded up yet another stairwell through the courtyard of the Organna palace. It helped that the soldiers she faced were quite skilled, too. Each one of them fought so much hard, bringing rough weapons to bear and shouting angry invectives at her. She was particularly fond of “Sith demoness” actually … It was a first.

Now Lusiel watched yet another Organna guard wilt like a piece of over-cooked lettuce into a pile in front of her booted feet, blood seeping from between his lips. What a sweet challenge, getting into those doors was proving to be, Lusiel thought. Quinn looked down at the dead soldier, grumbled sourly, "It seems someone at General Organna's headquarters was able to transmit a message warning of our arrival, my lord."

She chuckled softly, "Blenks wasn't completely useless after all, hmm?"

"Indeed. I am sure General Gesselle would have been quite proud of his tenacity."

Another group of guards suddenly barreled at them from out of a nearby room, trying to surprise them both. They likely pondered their chances huddled on the other side of the doors, before making the wild rush at them. Lusiel only responded, raising her lightsaber to deflect several blaster shots which would have hit Quinn. It seemed they were _aiming_ at him, even! Combined with her most recent anxious regard over her captain’s welfare, Lusiel was practically snarling as she leaped at the men, propelled by her own manipulation of the Force. Her momentum was great enough, she managed to fairly squash one of the pitiable soldiers under her boots as she landed, just before slicing towards another one with her lightsaber. The man danced out of her reach – nimble and quick to avoid the slash of her weapon.

The sound of a blaster firing from behind her had Lusiel twisting around, though, and she looked to see Quinn engaging the third soldier. She fiercely pushed the soldier, the Force moving in a hard rush at him so that he hit a nearby wall with crushing damage.  He gave out one brief shout of pain and desperation before he died. Quinn looked over at the soldier’s crumpled form, nodded with satisfaction.

But the distraction cost her. The swift-footed Organna soldier she was fighting swung at her exposed middle with a vibroblade, yelping with desperation. Lusiel leaped sideways, almost avoiding the swipe of the sharp-edged blade but not fast enough. Blood bloomed in a stripe just along the curve of her hip, and she stumbled a single step, loosed a small gasp at the sensation of pain.

The pain was just enough to heighten, raise up her innate rage. She tapped into it, gathered it together and growled angrily towards the man who hurt her. Lusiel swung out at him with a clenched fist, catching him across the side of his head. He swayed there on his feet, stunned. It was enough. Her anger was caught in the shrill scream of her blade’s swing as she sent it tearing into the man’s belly.

For pure certainty, she also swung her lightsaber down at the first one still laying quiet nearby her feet. That soldier lost his head quickly. And then Lusiel stood there, panting, with dewy perspiration that dotted her brow. Quinn’s blue eyes sparked with admiration as he eased himself closer to her, “Your injury, my lord. Let me attend to it.” He peeled back the torn material at Lusiel's hip, to better see how deep the cut went.

She chuckled down at his bent head. "Oh, the possibilities. If only there was time enough, I would drop my pants for you right here, Quinn."

Quinn smiled, although he didn’t look up from his work. "I would not be adverse, if only to better reach the wound. But I am certain I can repair the damage without such an extreme, my lord." He glanced up at her, then, "While I know you'd prefer otherwise, I'll finish quickly."

"Damn …" Lusiel sighed dramatically.

* * *

 

Lusiel stalked inside the ornately appointed room, like some mighty hunting beast focused on its prey. One of the guards rushed at her, his eyes wide in his face just before Lusiel’s lightsaber cut him from side to side and he spun off from her in a gurgle of pained motion. “So much dead, fool,” Lusiel muttered at his dying form. She looked up, towards the ringed figures of a slight man and his equally small wife, the guards that surrounded them.

And a Jedi. This one was a Knight; his eyes were fiery with passion and his lightsaber sparkled blue as he stood defiantly in front of the ones Baras wanted destroyed. "Men, around me! The Sith is here, she’s upon us!" Lusiel considered him through narrowed eyes, looked past the façade he presented. How close he was to falling, she thought. And he didn’t even know. They never did.

Poor, stupid Jedi. So unaware of their own weakness, that came from denying their passions. As if emotions could so simply be forgotten, rather than _used_ to make strength and power.

The little man behind the Jedi watched her through wide eyes, rings of horror marking his face. He looked at her as if seeing every nightmare come true, as if the events of the past days were so terribly beyond his ability to comprehend. "… But _how_? I thought surely so many soldiers, so much defenses would keep away one single assailant! How did you reach us," Jaesa's father gasped out. He stayed in a huddled heap against his wife, the both of them bent with shock in the center of the group.

"I assure you, the Organna guards were well trained. They fought well. Even managed a single blow! I was quite invigorated." Lusiel calm response terrified the man, so he began trembling as he stood there. He wrapped his arms around his wife’s waist, his chin shaking in fear. The Jedi brought his lightsaber up, so that the wash of blue light highlighted the entire scene.

The Jedi adamantly declared, "They were nothing. Not compared to me, Sith. You’ll not harm Parvin and Gregor Willsaam today. I vow it!”

Lusiel’s gaze glittered with amusement, “Then I disavow it. You’ll be barely a blip on the way to their destruction, rather." But Gregor Willsaam begged her. Not for his life, not then. The poor little fool of a man only wanted to understand.

But how did she explain what miniscule value his life really was right then. How did she tell him what he had become reduced to, this minor bit of time he had left? Why did so many have to die, he begged to know. “They just wanted to keep us safe! Why would you do this?” Lusiel pondered the answers she might give him, the intentions that guided her. To push Jaesa out into the open, to have her so much challenged she would come to Lusiel rather than suffer more loss – teachers taken from her, family gone, until there was nothing left but to face it wholly and head-on.

Lusiel needed Jaesa to come to her, before Baras won her for his own. If only Lusiel reached the girl first she would have her, and not even Baras would deny her such a prize for an apprentice. It would stymie Baras, keep him incapable of utilizing Jaesa’s skills without Lusiel’s control. It only took such careful maneuvering, and these people and their sad, little lives were just another step along the way.

Parvin Willsaam lifted her head from where it was pressed against her husband’s side, gasped out, "This has something to do with Jaesa, I just know it! Gregor!"

Lusiel smiled approvingly at the woman, "Give her a prize. Let us hope the girl is only half so wise as her mother.” Parvin looked sick, like she was close to losing her last meal right there on the pretty tiled floor at her feet.

"I knew she shouldn't have gone with the Jedi. I told you so! If she stayed, she could have married nobility, kept us from being servants any longer." Parvin looked near tears, "Sith, we’re useless to you. Jaesa isn’t here! She left us behind, just to be a Jedi!"

Lusiel shifted her stance, seeing the solid turn of the Jedi’s jaw as he listened to the couple’s entreaties. The anger that tightened his features likely matched her own, albeit for different reasons. Lusiel at least would never lie to the Willsaam girl, would not speak to her of affections only designed to hide her value and purpose. Everyone had a purpose, a design. That all these people declared themselves righteously caring of Jaesa, all to use her for their _own_ ends and without even telling her – that was as much a disservice to Jaesa as letting her waste away among the blasted Jedi!

"You’ll be my message to Jaesa," Lusiel gestured.

Gregor blinked at her stupidly, "You want us to give her a message for you?" But Parvin frowned up at her husband, "No, Gregor! Dead! If we’re dead, then we become a message Jaesa will understand!" And that’s when Gregor Willsaam began begging for their lives, desperation aching through the air around them as the guards shifted uneasily and the Jedi’s head lifted up with even more anger.

"Please, Sith. What can we do, what can we give you to keep you from killing us?"

Lusiel pretended thoughtfulness for a moment, even tapped her chin with a single pointed finger. Then she shook her head, "Nothing springs to mind, actually." She moved quickly then, pushing the Force towards the Jedi. But she didn’t even watch him fly bodily into a nearby stone column, didn’t stop to listen to the thud his frame made against the rock. Lusiel just whipped her hands up in front of her, compelling, guiding the Force through her own will alone. Parvin and Gregor Willsaam rose up slightly, their bodies suspended in the air for a long desperate moment. The guards shouted as they tried to reaching up at them.

Quinn winced as Lusiel tightened both her hands into fists suddenly, so that the necks of both people cracked stridently through the entire room. The power of the Sith was both so gratifying and terrible all at once, and Lusiel’s own power was the finest example of it he had ever seen. Like so many Imperials, he only aligned his personal strength alongside hers, rather than be quashed by its magnificence as it moved along. Gloried in it, rather than implored it be hidden away and denied. Quinn was no fool, to be left behind to die like these poor sods here.

The Jedi rose to his feet, stumbling over to stand next to the bodies of the Willsaam couple. His gaze was wide and horrified, he mumbled almost to himself more than Lusiel, said, “So fast … I’ve never seen anything like it before, didn’t have time to stop you. I should have stopped you straight-off. Should have …” He turned burning eyes towards Lusiel suddenly, “I’ll fix it now. Here. You will _pay_ for this.”

They always fell so easily, so simply. Proved the truth of the Sith before it was finally done. So Lusiel laughed at the Jedi, laughed harshly, "You can’t even do that much, Jedi. You don’t have the passion, the anger it would take. You’re weak!”

"I'll show you different, Sith!" He screamed at her, rushing towards her in a flurry. The blue of his lightsaber flared brightly over the entire room, arching up and over Lusiel’s head in a brilliant display of color and singing, desperate song.

Quinn jumped easily out from the way of hurtling Jedi, so that Lusiel could better face him. He only lifted his blaster to meet the rush of the soldiers who followed the Jedi, shot the first one in the face straightly, bluntly. She fell over onto the floor in a bloody heap. Quinn whipped his blaster around to fire again, even before the next soldier managed to turn his rifle in the proper direction. That bolt caught the man in the line of flesh right where his thigh met his stomach, a tender spot that left him screaming as he fell down onto the floor next to his dead compatriot. The noise was deafening. So Quinn stepped close enough to finish the man with a single bolt to his thick forehead, sending splatters of gore winging in a wash of red onto the floor behind his head. Only then did Quinn look towards Lusiel, watched her battle.

Lusiel danced constantly just out of the Jedi's reach, evading every swing of his lightsaber, every single one. Her lithe frame only twisted and turned in gorgeous synchronicity, like a melody all its own, with a unique and beautiful rhyme of motion and counter-action. But her own weapon struck again and then again -- stinging against the Jedi's legs and arms, catching him on his backside, his shoulder, and then back to his leg again. The Jedi sported an increasing array of stripes and injuries. Nothing that would kill him, nothing that truly promised an end.

Lusiel was playing. She taunted the Jedi’s weakness, his ineffectuality. And watched as he descended further and further into the dark depths of rage and bitter hate. He screamed at her, screamed loudly, "I'll kill you with my bare hands!" But Lusiel only laughed.

The Jedi turned the Force against her, completely enraged. He threw his head back, shouting a wild cry! Then he reached his hands out towards the Sith warrior. The Force caught her, smothered her darkly; it swept around her to hold her in place. The Jedi lifted her up, shook her so hard, so roughly her head shot back and forth in a crazed flurry. Lusiel choked, tried to say something, felt the inky blackness of the Force’s hold moving around her neck, holding her. She couldn't move, she couldn't call out, she couldn't stop him. He gripped the front of her robe, pulled her towards him and punched her in the face.

_Everything_ froze. It stopped.

Lusiel saw another room, another place. There was a man there, he was bigger than her, his head was covered in a mop of gray hair, his eyes were wrinkled, old. They glittered with intent, he was grunting as he moved her limbs, pinched her flesh, pulled and twisted her tiny nipples, gripped her thighs hard and yanked them apart. She couldn't move and she wanted her father there but he wasn't there and he couldn't come because mother had killed him.

She was all alone and it wasn't fair! He'd pay! He'd pay for everything, for all of it; he'd pay for touching her, he'd pay for the sound her father's skull made when mother hit him, he'd pay for holding her like this! She'd make him pay!

It became red, hazed and dim, and suddenly Lusiel was moving again. She glowed vividly with darkest red light; it shone from her skin, exploded from her eyes. Quinn gasped, awed as he watched her. The Jedi yelled out as he suddenly flew across the room, compelled by the simplest wave of Lusiel’s hand. But Lusiel leapt straight after him, stood over his crumpled form and raised her hand again. She sent him up into the air and then down, crushingly hard into the tiled floor. Again, up and down. And again. After the third blow, the Jedi stopped shouting, stopped whimpering. Quinn was fairly sure the man was dead. But Lusiel continued glowing and she didn’t stop. She jumped onto the Jedi's body, force leaping in place; up and down, wild, enraged. Eerily, she made no noise, so all Quinn could hear was the sound her boots made as they met the flesh of the Jedi's body. Over and over and over again.

Finally, Lusiel slowed and stopped in place. The red glow faded, receded back into the Sith. She panted, gasped. She looked around, dazed, confused. Lusiel was absolutely covered, from head to toe in inky dark red blood. It saturated her hair, dripped from her jaw, soaked her robe and trickled down her armor. She looked over at Quinn, and whimpered his name, "Malavai."

And then her eyes glazed, went dead. Quinn wanted to shout against it, hated the way everything that was so vibrantly Lusiel just … went away. He grabbed her arms, called her, "My lord! My lord! Lusiel!" But she only hung there in his grip. She was completely inert and withdrawn, like a broken doll. Like a puppet who’s strings were cut.

Quinn was horrified, as he realized how incredibly vulnerable she was. As she hung there, limply in his arms, anyone, anybody could destroy her. If it were anyone else by him holding her …? What could they do to her, what _had_ they done to her? This couldn’t be the first time. There was no real surprise in her eyes at that very last, only entreaty. Trust in him, only him. His name, and no one else.

Quinn shuddered, remembered the medical reports he only once considered distantly, “Bruising around the inner thighs, bite marks on chest, two blood types present.” His entire being twisted painfully, and Quinn yanked Lusiel closer to him, hugged her.

Baras would probably kill her right then and there, Quinn thought. And Quinn’s mind snapped back into motion. It was his duty to protect Lusiel, from _everyone_. He refused to consider the reasons why, he just moved steadily into action. Doors into rooms he'd never ventured in that damned mental house inside his mind began opening, and he rushed through them fluidly.

Within moments Quinn had flung a series of cloaks over both himself and Lusiel, gathered from the gear the Jedi had left behind against the back wall of the room. Satisfied they gave the appearance of Jedi he guided Lusiel out of the place, moving as fast as he could. He kept Lusiel's hand tucked into his own every step of the way, whispering to her, calling for her to wake up, come back. He never stopped for a moment, bypassed every wildly running squad that hurried past them towards the tower. Within minutes Quinn walked through the gates, Lusiel's hand clenched desperately in his own. He didn't stop.


	43. I Need You

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> There's a bit of music that, every time I hear it, makes me think of this scene. Feel free to check it out at Youtube if you get the chance. It's called "Soul Battles" by Ryan Taubert. The scene itself is explicit, so heads-up.

Quinn forced them all out. It didn’t matter to him, that it was only some small side room the Panteers carved into the side of the holding that housed their brief headquarters. He just forced everyone out of the medical clinic, insisting that his own lord was wounded and needed immediate care only he could provide her. Luckily there was no one lying prone and bleeding on any of the medical beds in there, was all he managed to think as he dragged a still-silent Lusiel through the doors.

So the Panteers shuffled them into the clinic, then hurried back out the doors again when Quinn demanded that they leave. One of the Imperial officers stationed there with the Empire's representatives tried protesting. But when the fool man reached for the hood that still obscured Lusiel's head, Quinn pulled out his blaster and pointed the weapon at him, promised him, "I'll kill you if you lay one finger on her." The man gulped hard, staring down the end of the blaster. Then he turned and fled, following the Panteers who'd been so much smarter than he was.

Quinn was acting on pure instinct. Everything in him said no one could be allowed to know how vulnerable Lusiel truly was right then. No one could see her like that. No one.

He turned to Lusiel once the room was quiet and they were alone again. He brushed the hood back so he could look at her again. Her dark brown eyes were dull, stifled. She stood there, mutely staring into nothing, and he ached. It hurt him, to watch her like that. "My lord, please … just come back." Quinn slowly wiped away some of the blood that had dried on her face, "I need to wash you clean."

It was something he could do, at least. Fixing the shattered minds of his patients was never very high on Quinn’s list of skills. He was just too blunt, too assured to easily tolerate the fragility of any psyche, human or otherwise.

Quinn began removing Lusiel's clothes, pulling at her robes and armor until she finally stood silent and insensible in the center of the room, completely bare. He grasped her fingers into his hand, guided her towards the bathing chamber nearby. The low lights of the space highlighted Lusiel’s pale skin, until she seemed to gleam. Like something ethereal, something angelic and fragile, and just so far removed from the powerful figure she typically portrayed.

He toggled the controls of the shower set against the wall of the utterly tiny refresher, thankful it sent streams of water tumbling down. Hot water would prove more comforting, than some sonic bath, rather. Quinn gauged the temperature of the water carefully, as methodically as he did everything. But he was rushing, pulled his own clothes off like he was maddened, frantic, and then reached out to hold Lusiel gently. He carefully guided them both under the spray.

Quinn wiped at Lusiel's face, swept his hands down, across her neck and shoulders, her arms, up and down. The dried flakes on her face, in her hair, and all down her shoulders and hands turned brilliant purple-red as the water hit her skin, before running in vicious rivulets down her torso, her belly, pooling under her feet before drifting slowly down the drain. Scarlet bright, crimson. He was glad not a single drop of it was Lusiel’s, slowly swiped his hands up and down her back.

All the while, Quinn whispered and chanted to her, crooning, "My lord, please wake up. Just look at me, I'm right here. It's me, it's Quinn. Just wake up." He tried smiling, felt like his face would crack from the strain. But he did try, "My lord, I'm standing here naked and you're not looking. What's wrong, hmmm? Not even a little peek?" But she remained insensate, standing there staring sightlessly at the wall of the bathing stall.

Quinn wanted to hit somebody, or maybe something. He only wasn’t certain who might be the best target. That damned Jedi, perhaps. Although the fool idiot of a Jedi was hit more times than Quinn could count, really. His broken, shattered remains made a rather telling red blot on the floor by the end of Lusiel’s rage.

Quinn only hated feeling useless, so he continued washing Lusiel. He shampooed her hair, smoothed her skin with a cloth until every speck of blood was gone. Finally, he just held her close, her face pressed against his chest as he wiped the water away from her face before it ran into her eyes. His voice rose up, strident, almost yelling at her, "My lord … Lusiel! Lusiel, wake up! Look at me, dammit!"

And just like that, Lusiel seemed to wake. She blinked and turned her head to look at Quinn, her brown eyes soft with bemusement. He groaned a slow sound of approval when she finally looked at him, and her name ghosted past his lips in a quavering refrain. He whispered it, "Lusiel. Ah, Lusiel, there you are." Then she gasped and clutched Quinn's shoulders, dug her nails into his skin desperately. She laid her forehead against the center of his chest, whimpering and wheezing as she fought for breaths. Quinn smoothed his hands down her back and hugged her, "You're hyperventilating, my lord." She only shook her head and held onto him, muttering muffled sounds that disappeared against the skin of his chest.

"What, my lord?" Quinn lowered his head, tried to understand what she was saying. But Lusiel leaned her head up suddenly, looked into Quinn’s blue eyes. She never loosened her hold of him, only pressed herself firmly against the length of his body until they were like two halves of a single whole. She fought for control again.

"Quinn, swear. Swear to me you'll never let anyone hold me like that! Swear it, that you’ll stop them! If I can’t move, can’t fight … Quinn, please. It _frightens_ me." Lusiel gasped out that last bit, her tone low and strained. Like she was forcing the words out, like she had never said anything so true before, not to anyone. Not the way she said it to him. And Quinn just froze, stood there with his arms wrapped around her and the water running down over their heads in a warm spray.

He felt every door of his mind shutting firmly, slamming shut. Until the only one left standing open shined into the mental space he'd long since devoted to Lusiel, that place in his mind he’d decided was his most favorite some time ago. He only finally gave it a name.

He loved her. Truly loved her, enough to give her anything and everything he had to give. Every drop of his blood he could spill, every breath in his lungs. He loved Lusiel, completely. And he only knew it right then.

Because a Sith did not say she was afraid. Sith used fear, they manipulated it. But they never, ever claimed it. Not to anyone. Fear was a weapon to be wielded, held over a person’s head and around his heart. To hear a Sith say, "I'm afraid," was like finding a mythical creature reborn from ashes and flame, like something unheard of, that didn’t exist anywhere. No Sith allowed themselves to be so vulnerable.

And that was the gift Lusiel gave to him right then. She shared her trust of him, told him she believed in him. That he would not fail her, that he would keep her safe. That he _could_ keep her safe, even. That’s how strong she felt as she shook in the circle of his sheltering embrace. It was a gesture he could never have anticipated, and he took it, claimed it. Even if she didn’t say the words. He understood her.

Quinn reached up, cupped her face in both his hands as he whispered across her lips the assurance she begged from him. He gave her the words. "I promise you, Lusiel. I will never let that happen to you. Never." Lusiel shuddered against him, laid her head back against his chest, and they rested together. She kept shaking, even as she fingered the pearl pendant hanging around his neck.

"Thank you," Lusiel said finally. She hesitated, glanced up at his face. "Did anyone see?"

"No. I didn't allow it.” He tried to ease her apart from him, “We should dry ourselves, and I’ll attend your injuries." But Lusiel shook her head and tightened her hold on him. She was still shaking.

"No. I need you, Quinn."

"My lord?"

Lusiel raised her head, felt her body quivering. She looked at Quinn, looked at him, at his eyes that glittered with such fierce devotion right then. She’d never needed someone more, than she needed him right then. Lusiel said it, said, "Touch me. I need you to _touch_ me. I need you …"

Quinn was startled. But he should not have been, he realized. A Sith depended on intense emotions, on powerful feelings that fueled their power and abilities. Lusiel’s trauma was profound, left her drained and feeling weak. The injury wasn’t to her skin, but to her mind and her spirit. And there was something he could do for her, some healing he could offer her. If only to replace one powerful feeling with another one.

And just like the promise he whispered across her face, Quinn wasn’t able to deny her this much of himself, either.

He eased his hands down her shoulders and across her back, down to her sides, where he grasped her waist. He didn't say anything, didn't give her any words, even. He just lowered himself, down, going to his knees. He looked up at her from where he kneeled in the front of her, his eyes so darkly blue they swirled like the dragon pearl against his chest. Lusiel whimpered, watching him.

Quinn pressed his lips against the flat of her belly, rubbed his jaw against the soft flesh there, back and forth. So that she could feel the brush of his chin, with its fine scrub of newly growing stubble scrape her skin so gently. He ran his hands down Lusiel's legs, reached her ankles and then wrapped his fingers around the inner flesh of her calves before starting to move his hands higher again. He smoothed Lusiel's legs apart, easing her open for him. He watched the petals of her sex be revealed, right in front of his darkening gaze, saw the sweet glistening nub of her clitoris twitch.

Above his head, Lusiel whispered, "Yes. Like that. Touch me there."

Quinn nudge her clit with his nose, breathed against it, blew a soft bit of air over her sex. She jerked, sighed. He rested one of his hands at the back of her knee, edging her leg up and apart, placing her knee against his shoulder and spreading her wide open to his touch. Then he looked back up at her from his kneeling vantage point, staring into her eyes, seeing how the chocolate of her gaze shined down at him, desiring, hot. His tongue darted out, swiftly, patted against her clit. Again. Lusiel twitched, pressing her hips forward and closer to his mouth, appealing without saying a word.

Quinn began to lap at her, his tongue moving in darting, twisting circles against the sweet female essence of her. Lusiel threw her head back against the wall of the bathing stall, shaking it back and forth as her hips continued to dance against Quinn's face. Her knee quivered where it rested on his shoulder. He moaned softly into her sex, and Lusiel felt the vibrations against her core, cried out wordlessly. He raised his fingers to her opening and eased one inside, moving it back and forth in her, pulling softly against her inner walls and feeling the tight grip those honeyed muscles inside of her provided. He moaned again and Lusiel almost screamed, "Yes! Don't stop, please! Malavai! Don't stop!"

Quinn thrilled when he heard his name, pulled her clit into his mouth and started sucking, thrusting his fingers into her core, moving in a steady rhythmic motion. Until he felt it begin. Lusiel began quivering, shaking. Her sweet inside tightened and pulled against his fingers. Her clit swelled and then pulsed under his tongue. He groaned as she shuddered wildly against him, held her flesh softly there in his mouth and eased his tongue in gentle caresses across the little bud there.

She gradually softened against him. Sated, silky. Quinn slowly released her clit from the hold his mouth had on it, rubbed it gently with his nose again, kissed it. Then he eased her leg off his shoulder and climbed steadily to his feet. Lusiel looked at him, reached out to touch him. But Quinn backed away, shaking his head.

"No. Not here, like this. I want it to be perfect, the first time. Not when you're hurt and injured like this," Quinn cupped her chin in his hand, smoothed his thumb across her lips. He considered all over again, how young she really was and how strongly he felt for her, regardless. Such an unexpected thing, and frightening even. How she could destroy him, if she wanted. And how that thrilled him so much.

Her dark hair hung wetly against her back, droplets of water streamed down over the smooth paleness of her face. Bruises marked her upper arms, her knees and even her hip – all the spots of her body where she had pressed and battled against their enemies. He’d never seen anything in his life so beautiful. Lusiel nodded, stilled.

Quinn turned off the water that still showered down onto them, moving her from the stall and wrapping a drying cloth around her. He rubbed her until she was completely dry and then pulled her into the adjoining room. Lusiel stayed quiet, watching him as he dressed himself and then rummaged in her pack for a change of clothes for her. He tended her small injuries, the cut on her hip and the bruise on her face, before dressing her and administering her a sedative. She blinked blearily at him, and he smiled.

"Rest, my lord."

"Quinn?"

"Yes?"

"I killed him didn't I?"

"Yes."

"Good."


	44. Baited and Hooked

Vette knew something had happened. Because of Quinn, of course. Lord Lusiel was about as close-mouthed when it came to her business, as a Sarlacc with a particularly chunky meal it didn’t want to let loose. Not that Quinn was any faster to tell her what was up, either. It was more how weird he acted during the holocall. He wasn’t all stiffly proper, like he usually was -- didn't ask about the persistent Broysc nonsense, didn’t complain about whatever she should’ve done and deliberately ignored, didn't even point at her and insist she keep Toovee's chef hat out of sight!

Nope, none of it. He was just all up in a hurry, talked to her brusquely. As if he was preoccupied with something and wanted the normal routine effort of communicating with her only concluded in as speedy and abrupt a fashion as possible. Then he said Lord Lusiel was "still sleeping", when Vette knew very well Lusiel never slept past the seventh hour.

"Was she injured?” Vette took to jabbering madly at the captain, “What's going on? What's wrong, Quinn?"

Quinn sighed. "Vette, she isn't in a kolto tank, she's sleeping. Please calm down. What is it you needed?"

"Right, yea, whatever. Look, Darth Baras called and insisted that I patch through a holotransmission. He seemed unhappy about something, although it's always hard to tell through that metal face of his."

Quinn eyed her sternly, "Do not disrespect Darth Baras, Vette."

"I didn't, geez! I was polite! Didn't even call him Toovee like I wanted to. Swear and promise! Not, mind you, that he would've known what I was talking about if I did," Vette nodded her head emphatically.

"He assuredly could tell how you _felt_ , Vette. Be careful!" Quinn pointed at her and Vette pursed her lips mutinously. Gods forbid that she ever admit the familiarity of Quinn’s arrogant gestures actually comforted her right then.

"Yea, yea. So do I patch uber-scary robot-Darth through, or hold off? I'm pretty sure I can come up with several reasonable excuses to keep him occupied for a time." Vette rolled her eyes as she lifted her two blue hands into the air and pantomimed quotation marks, “Even if he can _feel_ me, whoaahhh!”

Quinn nodded at her, "We need a few minutes. Stall him. But remain respectful!"

"Sure thing! I’m pretty good at playing idiot-slave-who-doesn’t-know-anything-important in holocomms galore. You’ve provided me endless practice lately. So yea. No worries!"

* * *

 

Lusiel stood in front of the holoterminal with almost disdainful disregard. She didn’t actually roll her eyes, but she stood there with her arms crossed over her chest, her chin tilted upwards arrogantly. As if she could only barely bother appearing, there. She could feel Darth Baras glaring at her, even past the mask that covered his face and the glittering blue of the holotransmission itself.  Lusiel certainly didn't want Baras to forget how much she despised him, anyway.

At least her head wasn’t pounding dully with pain, the way it did the last time she’d lost so much control. Lusiel only barely glanced towards Quinn, where he was standing off to the side from the terminal and idly considering the display on his datapad. She shifted as a twinge of desire jolted her belly, jerked her attention back to the holo when Darth Baras began intoning in that darkish drone he used so normally.

"That Twi'lek slave of yours indicated you were injured. Combined with the news I've heard regarding your search for Jaesa Willsaam's family, I am greatly concerned."

Lusiel arched one black eyebrow. "Of course you are. I’m just not quite certain why you would doubt my ability to overcome such negligible a challenge on this prettified world of weaklings.” She waved a gloved hand, her fingers only barely splayed as she fought back a seeming yawn, “The girl’s parents are dead, master. So is the Jedi who protected them. As you wanted.”

"Truly? Then it seems I’ve been misinformed. How vexing." Lusiel bit back her smiling satisfaction as Darth Baras shifted his portly frame and frowned at her. She sensed his angry discontent. How wonderful when every machination worked to its final, devastating conclusion, she thought. Baras considered, "At least the padawan is no doubt twisting with grief as we speak. Once again you impress me with your skills and your dedication, apprentice."

Lusiel shrugged. Then she leaned closer to the holoterminal, obviousy impatient.  Let Baras soothe himself with the belief she was only young and impetuous, given to extremes of action rather than careful manipulative steps.  That she wouldn't be diverted from her anger at the Duke was only so much worth it right then. "Kendoh is a maggot, master. His loyalty is to no one but himself and his own interests. And even those are worth nothing to you, here. So tell me what you’d have me do.”

Baras chuckled over her impetuosity. "Duke Kendoh had similar arguments where you are concerned, in fact. He contacted me to say you’ve disregarded my business on Alderaan to engage yourself in personal exploits. Even claimed you set explosive charges that killed several Thul dignitaries and allowed an Organna general to live … a remarkable story, actually. If it’s true." Baras pointed at her.

Lusiel eased her mental shields, enough to bare her regular irritation regards Duke Kendoh in a brief flare of emotion. She quirked just the corner of her mouth into a tiny smile, “I would have _embellished_ the truth, rather. It makes for a far better tale, at least.” Lusiel was pleased Kendoh had so far overreached himself, that he’d lied straight to Baras himself. She might have managed such an eventuality, with the most ploddish machinations. But Kendoh had acted all on his own! How delightful. “Mind you, it was the General’s lover I left alive, just so he’d remember. Nor did any explosive of my own destroy Kendoh’s rivals. It was Quinn who prepared our own charges, rather.”

Baras looked towards Quinn, sensing the truth. That they had known what Kendoh intended and left him to his own devices. Left him to strangle his own self, in fact. Quinn was no more surprised than Lusiel, not by Kendoh’s actions at least. But there was … something, Baras thought. And even Quinn was able to obscure whatever was bothering Lusiel.

Baras focused on his apprentice again, “I despise anyone who thinks to deceive me, apprentice. I will not tolerate Kendoh’s sudden lack of usefulness. Deal with him accordingly, so that we can move on to more important matters.”

"Of course, master."

* * *

 

Kendoh was squirming. Like a little worm on a great big hook, even. Lusiel rather enjoyed the show he provided her, enough that she only barely considered telling him there was nothing – no bit of dissembling he might do that would save him today. The man was going to die. And it had taken so precious little effort and hardly any planning.

If only everything was so simple, she thought.

But Lusiel was intent on leaving Alderaan. The entire place offended her, with its pretty facades and illusions of decency and honor. She wanted nothing so much, than to surround herself with the familiar quiet of her own space, to meditate, to regain her shattered equilibrium. At least Quinn stayed close, stepping steadily behind her as they approached the Duke in his offices. Quinn’s satisfaction at knowing Kendoh was doomed equaled her own, another fact that greatly pleased Lusiel. It was almost as good as giving him some fine present, she decided.

Lusiel cut Kendoh off mid-sentence, refusing to listen to him babbling politic nonsense about his awkward positions. Such protestations only left her thinking of Kendoh in rather unflattering scenes, actually. "Shut up, Kendoh. I simply don’t care to listen to any excuses from you. You told Baras I murdered your rivals, called me a traitor!"

"That’s not precisely true, actually!” Kendoh wrapped his fingers together, subtly wringing his hands as he stood there. His eyes darted around the room, like he was looking for an escape route. But there was none. Only Sith, all of them lining the walls and watching him through hard, cold eyes. “Several of my opponents were exposed when you destroyed one of the generators. I did seize the opportunity to kill them. But when your master called me, asking me what happened … well, I had company at the time. I couldn’t admit to my maneuvering right then, so I claimed you had destroyed them. Inadvertently, mind you.” He stammered the words.

Fimmress scoffed. Loud enough, that Lusiel could easily hear him from all the way across the room where he was standing just inside the far door that lead outside. "That’s a lie. _You_ contacted Darth Baras yourself. I was the only one here." Kendoh held up his hands, as if imploring Fimmress. Foolish, to the very end.

Lusiel shrugged a glare in Kendoh’s direction. "Your lies to me are only as useful as those you spoke to Darth Baras. You destroy your own self, with every twist of your own lips."

Duke Kendoh began crying. Lusiel was certain those were real tears that leaked out of his eyes and slid down his face. He held up his hands, begged her, "Wait! Wait! I knew you would succeed, it was harmless. Please, please don't kill me." He glanced at his Sith guards, "Fimmress, you and your men are assigned to me, to defend me if I’m attacked! Do something!"

Fimmress looked bored as he deliberately leaned back against the door, obviously blocking Kendoh’s only way out of the room. "You were warned what place you held, if it came down to choosing between serving you or the interests of Darth Baras. If his apprentice decides that you’re to die here, then we’ll not intercede." Several murmurs of dark delight sounded from the Sith lining the walls of the room, and Kendoh took to sobbing. Really sobbing. Wails ripped from his throat, harsh enough that saliva splattered his chin, soaked his fancily cropped mustache.

Lusiel didn’t say anything more. She was more interested by then in cutting off anymore sound coming from the Duke. He was giving her a new headache, in fact. Not even Quinn’s spurting amusement helped soothe her angst just then.

She used her lightsaber, rather than gift her captain with the chance of shooting the Duke. The presence of the Sith in the room demanded her own hand do the work, so that any question, any consequence would be her own. She would not allow Quinn to suffer even a sideways glare of recrimination for the death of an Alderaniaan nobleman, especially one so unimportant as Kendoh.

Kendoh shrieked one last time, right before the crimson glare of Lusiel’s blade met his narrow, pinched face. He spun on his thin, booted feet, hung suspended in the air for what seemed like forever before finally toppling over on the floor face-first. Fimmress strode across the room to stand next to Lusiel as she stared down at the dead man for a long moment.

He glanced sideways at her, “I would have gladly assisted you. Suffering this man’s mere presence for so long was a travail.”

Lusiel narrowed her gaze as she looked back at him, “I need no _help_ killing such a worm.”

Fimmress shrugged slowly. “It was only a polite way of admonishing you for stealing the pleasure for yourself. My lord.” He inclined his head carefully, right before backing from her presence. Quinn watched him move away.

“He’ll bear watching, my lord.”

“Him? Of far greater importance, is whoever it is he calls master, rather. That’s the one to watch out for.”


	45. Tell me what happened

Quinn knew when Lusiel came to stand in the doorway of the bridge, behind him. He didn’t stop his work, only continued tapping against the screens in front of him. The ship responded to the surety of his commands, as always. It hurtled towards the Imperial fleet in a single, focused motion. Lusiel padded further into the space, until she stood next to him and watched the stars fly past the viewscreens in front of them.

She had told him once, how much she enjoyed the shine of the navigation maps over his face and form. Seeing her dark eyes glitter under the same wash of light and color, Quinn really did understand her feelings. Lusiel glimmered in the light of the space, the tingling brilliance of the stars passing them by, until he very nearly believed she was one of them made real and standing right there. He felt the taut reach of desire thrumming in his chest, the longing for her that never seemed to disappear.

Lusiel was calm, better really. She was garbed in her favorite tunic and pant set, the one she wore whenever she moved comfortably around the ship and far from prying eyes. All burgundy and black, that hinted at her inner strength. Quinn suspected she'd meditated in her quarters, where she retreated some hours earlier. And despite Vette's insistence she eat something first, too. Quinn frowned at her suddenly, "You must be hungry, my lord."

Lusiel smiled cheekily. "Perhaps. Will you join me, then?"

"Would that assist you in finishing a meal, my lord?"

She chuckled, "Please tell me the show you provide me this time around includes you removing your pants, at least."

Quinn shook his head as he followed Lusiel from the bridge. The ship was silent, still. Especially with Vette no longer bounding through the hallways like a ball in a child’s play game, not after the twi’lek retreated to her bed some hours ago. But even Toovee was propped against one of the lounge sofas they passed, where Quinn left the droid after manipulating the droid’s operating systems again. Never let it be said, that Malavai Quinn could be outmatched by any droid’s circuitry, even in its programming.

The ship only hummed with air and pressure as it moved along. He was alone with Lusiel, in as much as they might be assured of it.

Quinn gestured for Lusiel to take a seat at the mess table, retrieving a plate of the stew Toovee had prepared for dinner. At least the droid was good for that much. Quinn placed a small saucer holding a fluffy biscuit next to her plate, so she could soak the gravy from the brief bowl. Then he turned his attention to the information on his datapad as Lusiel began to eat, knowing she would be more comforted by his presence than any chattering conversation. Without distraction, Lusiel ate her food steadily, sitting back in her chair only after her plate was wiped clean with the last of her biscuit.

Quinn glanced at the empty dish, "Do you need more, my lord?"

Lusiel shook her head, feeling replete. Quinn nodded, moving to get two cold drinks before settling back against the table again. He regarded Lusiel as she took a sip from the glass, the fruit juice made from Almakian apples Lusiel enjoyed like it was a desert. Quinn was quiet for a long moment, before he finally nodded, "Tell me what happened, then."

Lusiel glanced down at her glass, eyeing the swirling liquid inside. It shone like purest amber, settled her stomach after she ate. At least she didn’t pretend she didn’t know what he referred to, Quinn thought. But then Lusiel believed Quinn was far more aware of the Force than he gave his own self credit. So she shrugged now. As if the story was negligible, "He was one of my testers. An older Sith. I remember his gray hair and wrinkled eyes, the way he looked at me."

"I remember being tested when I was very young. But I don’t remember any large group of Sith in attendance." Quinn sipped some of his juice, eyeing her over the rim of his glass. Lusiel smiled tightly.

"I was an unusual potential, though, showed incredible aptitude even as an infant. It delighted my mother, from what I was told. I often imagine it’s precisely why my parents had a second child, even. But then two such powerful Force users in one line would be … extraordinary.” Lusiel thrummed the top of the table with her fingers, remembering. “It never mattered to me. My brother was tested, too. When the Force wasn’t a tool he could manipulate, he found other devices. For me, the Sith were focused in their considerations, with numerous tests and challenges. They were heightened after my father was killed. My mother’s family was determined I _prove_ myself."

Quinn noted the way she sneered the word family. As if the bonds tying her to them didn’t even exist, mind you. But she _claimed_ her brother, called him “mine” at every chance. Quinn realized Lusiel’s brother was valuable, important to her. Likely enough, that Lusiel wouldn’t lost sight or knowledge of him, either. Where was he, Quinn wondered. "So it was a Sith test, then?"

"No. It was no test, even if he attended the estate in the role of tester. He pulled me away, somewhere private. Where the others couldn’t see. I learned later I wasn’t the first girl child he’d touched, not even the first one who tried fighting him off.” Lusiel lifted her eyes to look at him. Her gaze looked nearly black, with only the thinnest ring of brown around the edges, “I was only the first who managed to succeed. By the time it was finished, there was little left of him that could be recognized as human."

Quinn dropped his face down to look at the table top. He clenched his fists against the surface, glaring. Lusiel hummed lightly and ran her fingers along his knuckles, "It was a long time ago."

"I know. It truly doesn't help to know that, however. You were alone!"

"Not for very long. It’s why I killed him, mind you. He held me down, frightened me and I was crying. Khyriel came, he was prepared to fight for me. The Sith would have destroyed _him_ , and that was when I became angry." Lusiel asserted, "Then it became a test, of course."

Quinn was confused. "I don't understand."

"Malavai ... He was chosen to test me, precisely because of his strength in the Force. No stripling of a girl should have managed such a feat.” Lusiel looked away, considering, “I was already considered exceptional. But I received far more attention after that, than many other acolytes. My brother as well, really."

"So it was your ability they wanted, that chance at rage I saw against the Jedi in the palace," Quinn murmured. He remembered the broken mess of human body left behind on the floor of the palace on Alderaan. The potential of destruction such as that would prove incredible to anyone capable of harnessing it.

But Lusiel shook her head, "No. I was taught to avoid it. I lack control enough, and it debilitates me. I'm incapacitated for too long a time and emotionally compromised even longer. Tremel told me it was too dangerous, called it suicidal."

"What did he mean?"

"If all that I hope for is to take my enemies into the Void along with me, then I should use my purest rage like that. There are only some people worth it, who are important enough."

Quinn stared at her. “But _you_ are important, Lusiel.”

Lusiel shrugged, “Of course. And they would give me just as much, too. It’s why I would do it, if need be.” She didn’t tell him the words, didn’t say how it was she had added him to that minor number of people in her life. She only settled back against her chair, remembering, remembering. “ _You fight for each other, when no one else will. Nothing is more important, nothing is worth more. Anyone who tries convincing you different, who tries to hurt any of you --_ that _is your enemy. Destroy your enemies utterly_.”

Quinn shifted in his seat, watching her thoughtfully. There was something there, just out of his reach … some bit of insight he couldn’t seem to grasp. He decided it was purely Sith, whatever it was. So Quinn only leaned forward, looked at her intently. "Did he rape you, Lusiel?"

"I killed him before he could finish it. I was bruised; I think he bit me, even. Then Khy distracted him, and I killed him."

Quinn sighed around the feelings of pride and admiration swelling in him, the relief that such wounds didn’t break her. She was eight years-old, a Sith of such tender age and she still proved capable of wrecking a more experienced, wizened Sith into brittle ruin. They called her exceptional. Of course he would want her today.

Quinn looked at her again, "I meant what I said, my lord. I will not allow you to be scared like that. Not ever again."

"I know. I'm counting on it."


	46. Meetings and Plans and Nar Shaddaa

Tivva didn't bounce as much as her sister did. With Vette bopping in a particular weave along the concourse right in front of Lusiel, that much was particularly obvious. Tivva was just as blue as Vette, however. Lusiel could also see they shared a certain shape to their eyes. The brow, perhaps.

But that’s where the similarities between the two women ended. Tivva was a shattered figure, despair lined every bit of her blue skin, until she looked nearly dull up against Vette’s trim frame. It was like life had steadily battered at the twi'lek, until she finally just gave up any hope of fighting. Lusiel was leery of even smiling at her, certain Tivva would perceive it more as a feigning taunt or jeering preparation for some sort of maltreatment. It actually took them several moments to convince Tivva who Vette really was, in fact.

Lusiel’s aunt had a similar effect on the servants in her household, actually. A regular consequence of the most ordinary, blithe sort of abuse, until the ones who served you were more likely to duck their heads from fear of you than any sort of loyalty. Stupid of the master, basically. Hey, maybe Tivva spent some time in Pella Hejaran’s estate, Lusiel pondered. "Maybe we got the wrong Tivva, Vette. How common is the name?"

Vette looked at Tivva with large, round eyes. Even without considering her through the Force, her sadness was a real, aching sort of headiness. "It isn’t, really. Never heard of anyone called 'Tivva, Tivva, gonna squeeze ya'," Vette hummed some unfamiliar rhyme. Lusiel bent her head, trying to place the lyrics of the song.

Tivva gasped, her face stiff with shock as she stepped backwards from them both. The twi’lek slave reached out towards Vette, mumbling a name Lusiel didn’t recognize. "Ce'na?" Lusiel leaped sideways when Vette squealed loudly and jumped straight into her sister’s arms, giggling loud enough Lusiel could hear her even over the pulsing notes coming from the band singers on the other side of the casino. Nar Shadda was still so blatantly brash and downright smelly a world – why anyone would suffer living on such a planet, ever, continued to confound Lusiel to no end.

The two twi'lek women spun around in clinging circles, practically crying real tears from joy and excitement. Lusiel cocked her head as she watched them go at it, wondering how likely it was Tivva's brief costume would withstand the wild encounter. But she quickly determined Tivva's outfit, while diminutive and … stringy, was really designed for intense and vibrant movements. It stayed in place, at least, and it kept all the really important parts of Tivaa’s body covered from over-curious eyes. Lusiel wondered if there was some trick of the Force to make it work, in fact. It didn’t seem the strings were _that_ strong.

Lusiel looked up from her purveying judgment of Tivva’s clothes once the dancing stopped, saw that Tivva was looking back at her. Tivva’s gaze was far more shuttered and cautious than Lusiel had ever seen from Vette. Tivva looked down at Lusiel’s hip, where her lightsaber was pinned onto her belt, and she shuddered only lightly.

Lusiel’s eyebrow quirked upwards, as she wondered where the twi’lek might have witnessed a Sith weapon. Vette rushed to introduce Lusiel, her tone not quite apologetic even if it was hurried, "This is my friend, Tivva. Yea, yea. So she's obviously Sith but don't let that fool you." Vette leaned forward, whispering dramatically, "She's a puppy dog."

Lusiel snorted, "I most certainly am not! Remember that last fellow on Alderaan. I bet _he_ wouldn't call me a puppy dog." Vette waved her hand dismissively, making a drawn-out snorting sound.

"Pbbbfffttt! He doesn't count. That guy’s dead!"

"Precisely! I destroyed him, so I am most certainly no _puppy dog_." Lusiel sneered the term with melodramatic flair. Tivva stared at them both, her head bouncing back and forth between them as they chattered. She looked flummoxed. Lusiel finally bowed her head respectfully to the woman, intoning with extraordinary politeness, "I am charmed. Any family of Vette's is a friend to me."

Tivva scoffed into her sister’s face, "Why would you call yourself Vette? Sounds like some old gangster I heard of, from the tech center."

"Blah! Old days for me. I’m way past that now." Vette glanced around the yawning round room of the casino’s main floor, the various patrons singing drunkenly and otherwise carousing madly. "So I'm guessing this wasn't a voluntary … career move for you, Tivva."

Tivva turned a purplish hue as she glanced over at the casino’s floor manager, saw him eyeing her through rough, beady eye-stalks. A Gran, of course. Lusiel had always through Grans were ugly creatures, and this one was particularly unpleasant. His skin was sallow, perfectly complimenting chunky stalks his eyeballs were mounted on. Disgusting, she thought.

Tivva muttered sideways towards them, "Two years I’ve been stuck here. Didn’t think it would be so bad at first, since I’m usually sold before long. But I’m getting too old now, harder to nab the notice of more pleasing masters. This is … shit, it’s killing me, Ce’na."

Vette shuddered as she stared down at the floor, idly toed a crack in the tile plates under their feet. She glanced at Lusiel from the corner of her eye. "So, uh. Wow. Big favor …"

Lusiel loosed an amused huff of sound. “And you call me a puppy dog? Look at you! If I offered you a biscuit, you’d likely pant and drool!” Then Lusiel waved over at the Gran, gestured imperiously, “I need to purchase this female twi’lek. How much?” The transfer of funds into the casino’s accounts took mere seconds, with precious little haggling. The Gran eyed Lusiel’s weapon rather closely, as much as Tivva did. All three eye-stalks, no less.

Vette shrieked and danced as much as one of the entertainers high up on their poles dotting the casino floor then, dragging her stunned, stiff older sister towards one of the betting tables. “Come on, Tivva! With luck like this, we’re sure to hit the jackpot tonight!”

Lusiel watched them begin making celebratory toasts up against the table, both of the women now dancing and singing bright songs. A crowd gathered around them quickly enough. Lusiel rolled her eyes, elbowing the Gran as she turned towards the doors, “If any one of the miscreant visitors to this establishment manages to disrupt their reunion, I will personally seek you out and remove every one of the stalks from atop your fat head. Do you understand me?” The Gran jabbered some pretty promises at her, saying how safe the two twi’leks would be under his watchful gaze.

Vette turned around just in time to see Lusiel stalking out of the far doors, her armor and weapon causing almost everyone to gasp and hurry out of her path as she went. Then Tivva gripped her arm and leaned against her side, and Vette turned back to the fun at the table.

* * *

 

It wasn’t so often Lusiel was able to visit a world without someone following behind her, watching her so carefully. Why did it have to be Nar Shaddaa where she could find this sudden privacy, she snorted. But that had her breathing in the putrid wafts of air that seemed to persist on the world whenever she was there. Lusiel actually wondered just how many Hutts it took, with their flatulent waste firing up all around them, before the atmosphere became this stuffy, heavy thing that eeked its way into a person’s pores, no less. At least the mathematical conjecture might occupy Quinn for a while, she thought. If he were here.

But Quinn was granted leave enough to attend the rescue of some old officer friend of his, off in Broysc’s fleet. A fellow called Ovech. Lusiel had attended the holotransmission from Ovech, that requested assistance. Bad enough, she thought, that Broysc abandoned the officer to be destroyed by enemies of the Empire. But the Moff had gone far enough, to block any rescue efforts that might have reached Ovech, too. The useless waste of Imperial troops offended Lusiel, rather. She gladly directed Quinn to lead a team that would secure Ovech and his men.

That left her with time to spare, to visit Nar Shaddaa in relative privacy. Especially after ditching Vette at the Casino tables.

Lusiel leaned back against the cantina booth and sipped from her glass, enjoying the fruity concoction that filled her glass whenever she found one of these establishments. She only glanced up idly when the cloaked figure approached and slid into the booth next to her. Lusiel smiled at him, "I was beginning to wonder if you'd actually show."

Tremel barked a brief laugh, "If I'd been on time, we would've had to wonder who was following me. How utterly distracting, rather. No, I just took a more circuitous route."

Lusiel nodded. She was garbed in standard Nar Shaddaa dress, a particularly ugly midriff-baring mess of an outfit colored lavender of all things. Her armored plates and gear was stashed carefully in the room she had rented nearby, and secured by Toovee, who was likely as bugged for surveillance as her armor. Her weapon, though. That was secured in the folds of her pretty robe, of course. She knew no one could have managed to slip recording apparatus onto her lightsaber, not without her notice.

Tremel eyed her carefully, "You don't appear Sith. Well done."

"You should be grateful. This appearance is galling, and I do not enjoy it in the least. Perhaps my brother can provide me some better guidance on a more proper disguise sometime in the future.” Lusiel’s shoulder lifted in a small shrug.

"I’m certain he could provide you so much direction. I was impressed with his skills when he visited Nar Shaddaa," Tremel slanted a hard look that circled the cantina room. Then he looked back at Lusiel, his chin lowering, "Your note mentioned an incident on Alderaan."

Lusiel quaffed a large drink from her cup, "I lost control."

Tremel breathed out slowly. His voice was a hard thing, like blaster bolts from a pistol. "Yet you survived. How?"

"My captain. He saved me."

Tremel leaned forward, intent. "Tell me about him."

* * *

 

Lusiel found Quinn in the Black Wing’s med bay. He was pulling items out from various cabinets and recording an accurate count of all the contents onto the datapad he was holding. Lusiel wasn’t precisely certain why the routine inventories were so necessary, unless Quinn was careful to replace each minuscule bandage slapped on the littlest bruises or most minor burns that came from their standard work around the ship. Maybe he only liked counting the stuff, she thought.

She watched him for several seconds, leaning her shoulder against the door’s edge as she considered the turn of his hips and buttocks when he bent to thumb through the various containers in the lower cabinets. Lusiel slowly ran her tongue in a line over her lower lip, and frowned. If Tremel had his way, at least, Quinn might never count a single item in her med bay again.

Tremel’s plan was impossible, she thought. The thing would likely kill Quinn, even in the attempt. He wasn't strong enough to accept so much of the Force against his mind. Even if he survived, the damage would probably be incredible. But Tremel argued with her, adamant it was the only possible solution to the dilemma the captain represented.

He pointed at her, "You’re not fool enough, that you don't realize how deeply compromised by Darth Baras the Imperial surely is. You said he served Baras for years, after all. Do you think Baras has not used that time to sink his teeth into him? No, Lusiel! It's the only way!" Tremel deplored her emotional squirming over the proposed course. “You’re being overly female!” He didn’t laugh when Lusiel shrugged and reminded him she _was_ female.

Tremel had looked at her and said with brutal clarity, "A Sith who loves is vulnerable. Either you eradicate the weakness. Or you make it _stronger_." Now, Lusiel sighed. She consigned the motion to that region of her consideration called "things to try after I figure out how to do it without killing him".

Then Quinn looked over at her from across the bay. His eyes brightened. "My lord! My efforts were successful, and Major Ovech and most of his officers were saved! I was able to infiltrate the major's ship and seized control of its operating systems. Once I identified where his men were being held, I freed them, and locked Moff Broysc's occupying forces onto the bridge long enough for Ovech's men to rescue him without further interference."

Lusiel smiled. "I never doubted you. Not even once."

"The Empire is stronger for having retained Major Ovech, rather than squandering him. Thank you for the opportunity, my lord. I'll return to my duties." Quinn looked at the materials scattered around the floor of the med bay, critically. Then he swung his gaze back towards Lusiel again, narrowed his eyes at her. "Have you been eating, my lord?"

Lusiel laughed, “I missed you, Quinn.


	47. Come and Find Me, Then

There was a negligible lull in the recordings he long ago placed among Lusiel’s gear. It bothered Quinn, those brief hours where he noted no movement, not even a breath from her. Just the sullen bleeping of Toovee’s intermittent diagnostics.

He wanted to ask her what happened, where she’d ventured without one piece of armor or gear that marked her as a Sith. Anything might have happened! Even the most powerful Sith could be caught off-guard, be surprised. Although on Nar Shaddaa a single push using the Force could send a robber or thief tumbling thousands of feet to their deaths easily enough, he considered. But the risk was still real enough, damn it!

Besides … what sort of entertainments on Nar Shadda might have required Lusiel to set aside her armor? That thought was what ate at him hardest, nagging at Quinn's peace of mind even as he went about his duties. And no. He couldn’t simply ask her about it, either. Lusiel would likely be displeased to learn he monitored her every movement. He could explain he acted out of a simple desire to protect her, of course. That was even largely the truth. But there was more to it, and she would certainly realize that much.

Quinn decided he was going to have to perform a medical examination on Lusiel. To be assured she wasn’t exposed to any negative effects from her journey to Nar Shaddaa, mind you. Although if an examination showed signs of certain activities during the past day or two as well, it wasn't as if he'd gone looking particularly for that information. Right?

That was when the console he was thrumming his fingers over right then began beeping with an incoming communication.

* * *

 

Baras was reveling. If he could’ve danced across the display showing over her holoterminal, he most likely would. Lusiel shuddered to imagine how his big, fat belly would jiggle through such an extraordinary show. Bad enough she had to endure his gloating countenance so much as this, she thought. He even rubbed his hands together! Then she sensed Quinn’s careful approach behind her, as he stepped just inside the room and stopped, waiting.

Quinn watched Lusiel, more than he paid Darth Baras particular note right then. She stood aloof and proud, there in front of the holoterminal. He thought she looked gloriously beautiful. Her dark head was bent sideways, with her arms crossed across her chest as she seemingly fought back a yawn. He felt a twinge of fear, that she might spark Baras to anger. But then Quinn dropped his gaze down to her backside, watched the pull of her pert backside under the folds of her Sith robes.

Quinn suddenly remembered the moment Lusiel came undone under his tongue. She had thrown her head back against the wall of the shower compartment, as she chanted his name in sofest cadence. She tasted sweet, honeyed. He wanted it again, wanted to put his mouth on her. Everywhere.

Quinn hardened into sudden and tight erection. And Lusiel stiffened, standing straight in front of the holoterminal. She didn't even look at him and he knew she was aware of his intense desire. He sighed under his breath, shifted to ease his desired response. Thinking, that most women had to actually watch for a man’s response. But the one _he_ adored sensed it through the damnable Force itself. He would never be able to hide from her, Quinn realized.

And he smiled, just as Darth Baras slowly wound himself into closing. "Every lead followed perfectly. Every planet ravaged. Yes, our adversary is growing ansty, I can feel it. I can feel it personally! You’ve done well, apprentice. Quite well. Expect news soon. Baras out."

Quinn stepped forward as Baras' image faded and Lusiel turned to face him. She smiled as her gaze skittered quickly down his front. Vette shoved herself off the doorframe she was leaning against, though. Lusiel smirked at Quinn, rather than tease him. He bit out, “I thought it prudent not to interrupt Darth Baras. But we did receive a recorded transmission. It’s ready for you to review personally, now." Quinn pressed several buttons on his datapad and gestured towards the holoterminal.

Together, the three of them watched as an image of a girl filled the terminal. Jaesa Willsaam was likely the same age as Lusiel herself, maybe a year or two younger. Maybe. The girl’s hair was light brown, perfectly bobbed to hang against her pale jaw and framing big, round brown eyes. Quinn thought she looked innocent, naïve. Lusiel breathed out, “Plainly unaware. They’ve mislead her.”

"Sith, I'm Jaesa Willsaam. My master, Nomen Karr, has no idea I'm sending you this message. Let's be real – we both know this isn't about us." She looked absurdly young, but Jaesa’s voice conveyed strength and temerity far removed from that initial impression. Lusiel rather liked her, even. That would make the entire process far smoother, she thought.

Quinn pondered her, too. But more from a tactical viewpoint, of course. "The hunted seeks the hunter." He wasn’t concerned with viewing Jaesa’s potential, the advantage gained in _winning_ her. The prize she was, to hold against Baras’ control.

"She’s strong enough, at least. She refuses to be hunted any further," Lusiel murmured.

"Our masters pretend otherwise. But this is personal and the two of us are only pawns in their private war. I won’t lose anymore loved ones, no more. It has to stop." Jaesa continued. "Maybe you're tired of all this nonsense, just as I am. So here. Coordinates to a ship where I'll be waiting. Meet me, if you’re interested in finishing this at last."

"Wow. She's got guts," breathed Vette. But Lusiel only shrugged, “They will trick her in this, too. Perhaps this time, she won’t forgive them. We’ll see if she’s capable of that much passion.”


	48. Springing their Trap

They were knights, two of them. Lusiel glanced at Quinn as she stepped forward to meet the Jedi. Because he was proved correct, all over again. She’d anticipated the Jedi would keep the girl from attending the meeting. But Quinn? He argued Nomen Karr would use the chance to bait Lusiel, like enticing a cat with a big, fat mouse.

Why any Sith would deny the value of such an officer confounded Lusiel. She considered tapping him on the shoulder, even, offer him a whooping, “Well done, Quinn!” But if she did that every time Quinn impressed her, the poor man would be left sore and bruised.

No, Lusiel decided. She'd just celebrate Quinn's worth in private. Even more in private if she could. Maybe she could get him in private tonight. Later, at least. Oh, right after these foolish Jedi were dead. Hey, up against that wall would be nice, she eyed the surface pleasantly.

Then the younger Jedi began jabbering. Lusiel almost smiled at the thought. Jabbering Jedi, indeed. "Well, well. It wasn’t a wasted trip after all. We should probably thank Master Karr, when we let him know the Sith showed." Lusiel was actually thrilled the fool was capable of playing her favorite game, that he tried making her laugh. She could only barely recall the last time someone truly amused her. Who was that last jokester, by the by … On Balmorra! The boy! What was his name? Durmat?

The other Jedi wasn’t so much fun, however. He even frowned at his tittering companion, only briefly. Then he shook his head towards Lusiel, implored her, "Stand down, Sith. The padawan you seek isn't here. Nomen Karr already convinced her better."

"It's just not your day. You were expecting one lowly little padawan to crush and, instead, you get us," snorted the first one.

Lusiel smirked at him, unable to resist the sheer temptation. But she did _not_ laugh! Even if this pitiable Jedi was so much more amusing than Durmat, back on Balmorra. "Oh, you'll do just fine. I enjoy crushing your kind, too." She considered him carefully, narrowed her focus on the Jedi. There was such anger, such base pride roiling in him, that he was very nearly quivering with it. One little nudge might be just enough, she imagined.

His friend fought against the inevitable, the poor fool. He even placed a calming hand against the shaking elbow of the failing Jedi. "Zylixx, please.” He raised his strong-boned chin towards Lusiel then, “Sith, do not fight us. Zylixx and I are fully trained Jedi knights, more than your match."

Zylixx snorted abruptly, "Come on, Ulldin. No Sith we’ve encountered ever had sense enough to surrender. You waste your time even asking.” Lusiel wondered what Sith they might have faced, that were so simply destroyed. Because this Zylixx wasn’t filled with the hate born from pain or fear, hadn’t witnessed the horrors that created angry defiance. No, Zylixx dripped with prideful overconfidence. Thick enough, Lusiel imagined it might have fallen in clumps onto the floor if it only could take solid form.  Only the weakest, ill-prepared Sith would have been undone by such brashness.  Acolytes barely past Korriban, perhaps.

No, Zylixx enjoyed using his power, _enjoyed_ the fight against an opponent easily overcome. He liked hurting people. Given the chance, he would make a rather easily directed Sith. Except he would only teeter into the darker places, where the insane lost themselves. Lusiel despised that weakness, hated insanity.

It was better to break Zylixx here and now, Lusiel shrugged. She smiled at him tightly, “Oh, admit it, Zylixx. You'd be quite disappointed if I gave up." The other Jedi, the calm one – Ulldin tried arguing with her, even so, "No! We do not pick fights, only defend ourselves."

Lusiel dramatically scanned the confines of the cargo hold, there in the corvette cruiser over Nal Hutta. The ship where Jaesa Willsaam’s message asked her for a meeting. “And yet _I_ was the one invited here. For a meeting, I was told. That was the word, was it not, Quinn? We were meeting here, for a discussion?” Quinn nodded emphatically, “The message we received indicated a desired resolution to hostile actions, my lord.”

“You see?” Lusiel waved her hand through the air, “I’m the one met with threats and demands for surrender. Rather than any peaceful overtures. You Jedi … you lie, as much to yourself as anyone.” Ulldin frowned at her.

But Zylixx stomped his foot angrily, “See, the Sith never surrender, Ulldin! The only certain way to meet them, is to fight them and kill them!” Lusiel did laugh at him, then. If only because he was _already_ fallen, the worst sort of failure to his order.

She laughed loudly, her slender hand placed gently in the center of her abdomen, “Ah, Zylixx. You’ve already embraced the dark side! I’ve known so many Sith who sound. Just. Like. You."

"Shut your mouth," Zylixx clenched his fists tightly, glared at her. Ulldin tried so hard to save him, reached out to him, "Zylixx! Calm yourself. The Sith is trying to unbalance you. Don't allow her to succeed!"

Lusiel gestured towards Quinn unobtrusively, thinking how close the fight was. When this Zylixx lost the last bounds of his control, he would come at her in a violent rush of powerful emotion and passion. Quinn’s newest gadget would be perfect, except it needed most appropriate placement. "Zylixx knows the truth. He only hopes to fool _you_ , Ulldin. Not me." She could feel Quinn gathering himself, tensing.

"Liar! I'm not weak like you!" Zylixx was almost shouting.

Lusiel took a breath, smiling as she delivered her final, devastating blow, "We fight so much alike, Zylixx. You’re as much Sith as I am. Why not admit it, rather than writhe in fear of it?"

"I won't be insulted by the likes of you! You die, Sith!" Zylixx flung out his lightsaber. Ulldin’s desperate crying was lost in the whirring scream of Zylixx’ blade. Only the briefest sound, as Zylixx yelled madly amidst the rush.

Quinn suddenly jumped sideways, his hand whipping quickly as he flung a spray of carbonizing gas towards Ulldin that froze the stronger Jedi from attacking Lusiel. Ulldin yelped only briefly, surprised and shocked as he froze into place.

Lusiel was already singing; her red lightsaber glowed its fierce tenor refrain above the entire scene. Almost a soft tune at first, her blade curved up and over her head. But it met Zylixx's blue lightsaber in an arc of scarlet symphony. Flawlessly, Lusiel stepped into her attacker's lightsaber, leaving Zylixx to stumble forward, his momentum suddenly upset. She didn't stop. Lusiel spun out and around Zylixx, sending her lightsaber through the air in a heady strain against Zylixx's upper legs, smiled darkly with satisfaction when he screamed out in agonized horror and started to fall. Lusiel cut him off, swinging her blade up and then down across the back of his head as he collapsed onto the floor.

Zylixx’ head made several thumping beats against the floor as it fell off from his neck and bounced away. Just in time enough, because Ulldin slowly broke free from Quinn’s gooey snare and watched his friend’s head spinning along the metallic tiles. He whimpered, turned his head up to look angrily at Quinn, growling out, “I could have saved him!” Ulldin raised up his lightsaber in a heady motion. But Lusiel’s blade sliced cleanly through his elbow suddenly, and Ulldin watched his weapon fall uselessly onto the floor. Still clutched in his shorn-off fingers, no less.

Ulldin screamed out, collapsed onto a single knee as he clutched his newly-made stump against his chest and looked up at Lusiel. “You made him fall. It was you … you did it.”

Lusiel shook her head, “I did nothing. I only showed you both the truth.”

"Nomen Karr will prove you wrong, he’ll show you!” Ulldin looked up, stared sullenly into Lusiel’s brown eyes, “This is finished, here. Kill me if you must."

"Oh, I must."

Ulldin sighed as he watched the red glow grow bigger against his vision. "May the Force … accept me."

* * *

 

"You did well, Quinn."

"So did you, my lord."

"A job so well done deserves a reward."

"Truly? What reward would you like, my lord?"

"No, a reward for you."

"My lord, pardon me. But are we arguing about who most deserves a reward?"

"Not really. We both want the same thing."

"Oh. Are you certain?"

"What do you mean?"

"Well, I know what I would like but I'm not terribly sure what _you_ would like."

"What, at all? Or just right now?"

"Since we're standing in front of the airlock, better with 'right now'."

"I want to touch you _right now_."

"Touch me? Where?"

"Right here, outside the airlock. I'm not sure Vette needs to watch, I mean."

"No, my lord. I mean. Where ... on my body?"

"Quinn, are you stammering?"

"Yes, my lord."

"I like that."

"Of course you do, my lord. You’ve made it a point to cause me to stammer quite often, actually."

"Where would you want me to touch you?"

"Right here. Outside the airlock, of course."

"Quinn, you make me laugh."

"Touch me. Here."


	49. Fighting Free

Jaesa could see the entrance to her master's quarters. He'd been so certain, that Darth Baras would never find him there. "He will assume I’d go somewhere distant, obscure. Not a place we're both so familiar with." Nal’Hutta was a place they both hunted secrets, hidden names and directions. Surely Baras would think the hunt moved somewhere far from Hutta.  So Master Karr retreated to the house he had there, stayed out of sight.

And yet Jaesa found Imperial soldiers guarding the doorway into Nomen Karr’s hiding place. Her heart broke, twisted with pain. Someone else that she loved was lost, she thought. How many of the ones she cared for would be taken from her?

It wasn’t fair!

If she was so strong, if she had so much power, then how was it she couldn’t save the ones she loved the most? Every one of them was only being destroyed. One by one, her teachers, every one who guided her, cared for her – all of them were lost, taken away. So she’d begged Master Karr to help her, show her how to fight and defend the precious few left. He only refused, though. “Stay away, hide yourself! I’ll defeat Baras once and for all, and the killing will stop. Trust me, Jaesa!”

But it wasn't happening.

Baras was winning, it seemed.

But how could that be, she agonized. If Master Karr was right and the Jedi were better, stronger? Worse, she'd begun to suspect that what was driving Master Karr had far more to do with beating Darth Baras, than truly helping and guiding Jaesa.

She was a pawn. Only a pawn. In a game of pride between two sides of the same coin.

She was going to prove it, damn it! Once and for all! She would not be used anymore, not so utterly. Not anymore! She wanted answers. She wanted truth. She wanted this to end, today.

It’s why she finally defied her master, and come to Hutta. Jaesa was determined to confront this travesty once and for all. To look into the eyes of the Sith who'd killed her parents, her teacher, and her friends. She didn’t even hesitate, just marched up to the door, defiantly holding her chin up into the air as the soldiers in their darkly elegant Imperial uniforms came to vivid attention. Jaesa waited for the soldiers to grab her, to hold her. But they leaned back from her, almost seemed frightened of touching her, even.

Jaesa was confused. And frustrated, as the soldiers waved her past them and inside the house where Nomen Karr should be working safely out of sight. They invited her to approach! What game was the Sith playing now, she wondered.

It had to be a game, of course. Master Karr insisted the Sith were deceivers, liars. They offered nothing but hate, he told her. They had no drive, no focus past the most horrid of satisfactions. They wanted chaos, ruin, destruction. They had no concept of right or good. They didn't know what it meant to care for or love others. The Sith were nothing but monsters, easily defeated.

Although, Jaesa pondered. If that were so, why was it so imperative she hide from them?

She emerged into the main room of the house, discovered them together. Her own master, Nomen Karr, was bound in a chair, spittle running down his chin as he shouted angrily at a woman garbed in a black and wine-colored robe covering a metallic breastplate and leg guards.

The woman – she had to be the Sith. But Master Karr told her Darth Baras' apprentice was a nasty, menacing creature befouled by the dark side of the force, her skin ravaged and her eyes spitting red flames. Jaesa was confused as she watched her, the woman’s beautiful face that stayed so calm even while Master Karr spit bitterly in her direction. She even smiled at him! Her dark brown eyes glittered from out of a pale, creamy face, all of it framed by inky tendrils of hair caught up into a cute bun against the back of her head. Her eyes weren't red at all but large and chocolate brown, shining brightly in her face.

It was Master Karr's eyes that were repulsive, swollen red and glittering with maddened hostility. _His_ skin was pale and twisted. And he was spluttering, screaming with anger and rage. At the woman and her male companion.

Jaesa noticed him for the first time. The man was quiet, unobtrusive. He stood silently behind the chair where Master Karr was bound, deferring to the Sith woman and following her directions as he kept her master secured. As dark-haired as the Sith, every look he sent towards the Sith woman through darkly blue eyes was respectful and approving. He followed her faithfully, Jaesa thought crazily.

"Ah, it seems our guest of honor has arrived," the Sith announced, pattering around a large table to greet Jaesa, her smile bright and curious. “I’ve wanted to meet you, Jaesa.” Jaesa blinked at her, at this Sith. Hardly the monster Master Karr had described. Weren't monsters supposed to be hideous? Did they smile at you? Did they say, "Welcome," and ask you to become comfortable?

"Stupid child! I told you to stay away!" Master Karr continued ranting, yanking against the bonds restraining him against the chair. The dark-haired man behind him pulled his arms back into place, grunting softly as he held him back.

Jaesa squared her shoulders and inhaled roughly. She faced the Sith, "I've come to demand you release my Master, Sith!"

The Sith cocked her head, seemingly considering. Her pouted mouth twisted with confusion. "But, Jaesa. I thought you wanted this over with. That is what your message said, right? That Nomen Karr has deceived you horribly, used you as a pawn against my own master. I only came here to stop him." The Sith woman leaned forward slightly, her gaze intent upon Jaesa, “You know he had Jedi knights attack me at the ship, above. Where you asked me to meet you. Ulldin and Zylixx, they were called. They tried killing me.”

Jaesa gaped at her, her mind whirling. "No, Jaesa! Don't listen to her!" Nomen Karr cried, wriggling against the bonds tying his hands. The Imperial officer slapped the back of his head with bruising force, hissed at him, “Cease! Shut up!”

"What have you done to him? He looks awful," Jaesa whimpered, agonizedly staring at Nomen Karr.

The Sith shook her head, glancing back at Master Karr regretfully. "He thought himself so much stronger, better than me. He became angry, when his pride could not bear losing to me in battle.” She turned back around to look at Jaesa again, shrugging, “He learned what so many Jedi try denying. That the dark is as much a part of us, as any light. Being Jedi does not make you immune to its influence. It’s better in fact to embrace the whole of yourself, than to hide from what’s so much a part of you.”

Jaesa stared at her, only stared. She had wondered, agonized the same way for so long a time. The Jedi insisted she hide her feelings, deny them, as if they were shameful. But when she asked why, she was only given cliché answers, as if by rote. No one could truly explain to her _why_ she was to prevent herself from feeling or even if that were possible. It was so confusing! So frustrating! And the first person to try and guide her to really understand was one of the monsters she was told to hide from!

Nomen Karr twisted in his seat, “You shouldn’t have come here! It was stupid! I told you to remain hidden! They’ll trick you!” Jaesa struggled with a growing sense of angry upset, “Isn’t that what you did? You tricked me! Was all of it a lie, a trick? Everything you told me?"

The Sith sauntered in a circle around Jaesa, examining her carefully, "Wouldn’t your ability have allowed you to see him, past his words? Haven’t you really looked at him?"

Jaesa shook her head, frowning with consternation, "Master Karr told me to use my gift only when it was necessary. I've never thought I needed to use it on him. But … Would you let me?"

"Why would I stop you from seeking the truth?" The Sith waved a hand in Master Karr's direction. Jaesa breathed in slowly, used her senses to see Master Karr for the first time, looked at the gleaming aura of his character wholly. All of the colors, the impressions and feelings that he hid so deeply inside of his own self.

"Pride, so much pride … envy, hate … and vengeance! No!” Jaesa stumbled back from all of them, noticed the Imperial glancing sharply at her. The man patted the blaster against his side, but the Sith raised her hand, commanded him with a mere glance. Jaesa felt tears stinging her eyes, “You’re trying to trick me, too! Master Karr told me! He said the Sith lie all the time! I would've known if this was in him all along, I would've known!"

The Sith woman frowned at her, her mouth pouted into a disappointed moue. “But I don’t have to lie to you, Jaesa. That’s what truly hurts right now, that it isn’t a lie at all. No, you just said you never looked before, that’s all.” The woman circled back around the table again, eyed the leaning, broken figure of Nomen Karr with a disgusted glare, “Jedi fool _themselves_ , Jaesa. They are so convinced of their falsehoods they don’t even recognize them for what they are anymore."

"I don't know what to believe, damn you! I thought I'd found something to believe in! Now you're telling me I'm wrong," Jaesa swayed as she stood there, whimpered as she choked back real tears.

"Jaesa, it's all a trick!" Nomen Karr was swearing again, "Just turn your power on the Sith. Look at her! Look!" But the Sith just laughed, “You say that as if I am trying to hide from the girl.” She looked at Jaesa, her dark eyes glowing.

"Look at me as long as you like, Jaesa. Go ahead." The Sith’s aura was dark, crimson red and brilliant. It didn’t swirl around her so much as it seemed to emanate from her. As if the Sith actually was the power and Force radiating from her, as if she was utterly immersed in the darkest Rage of the Force itself. Like it claimed her, belonged to her. It really was the most beautiful and powerful aura Jaesa had ever seen.

Jaesa cried out, frightened beyond measure, "You're so dark! Anger and hunger drive your emotions. You're cruel, malevolent. And terrible. You’re terrible! You will hurt people so easily, without regret, remorse!”

The Sith snarled at her, "I will not allow the ones I love to be hunted, mistreated or abused! Those who think to harm them will meet my rage, my passion in its full breadth, yes! The Empire is safer, more secure when it is stronger! Control, power is what secures my own people … not platitudes and mantras that whine of peace or forgiveness. I will make them stronger by my _will_."

“You killed my parents!”

“The ones who would have sold you to some wealthy man looking for a pretty, young wife? Those people?”

“I hate you!”

“Why? Define your hate, Jaesa! Tell me!”

Jaesa floundered again, dropped her gaze down at the floor as she chewed her lip. “This was a trap. You want to control me, too.” The Sith hummed approvingly, “It’s important, that you recognize your own potential. You are so much a prize, Jaesa. I can show you.”

"I’ll fight you!" Jaesa swore, glaring at the woman who killed her friends, her family. The Sith lifted her chin, smiling back at her, “I do hope so. Fighting every step makes you stronger.”

Jaesa fought. She was done with waiting. She waited as Master Yonlach was destroyed, and Yu-li cried against her shoulder that he’d failed to save him. She waited when her family was killed, her sweet parents who only wanted some small bit of bettering for themselves. Would marrying someone they approved of really proved so much terrible as this? She waited when Master Karr told her, and her friend Ulldin died for her. Jaesa was going to finish it once and for all. Now. No more waiting.

But the Sith was stronger!

Jaesa knew it only moments into the fight. She moved like a river would, fluidly, with purpose and power. It was as if she knew precisely where she needed to be moments before and then suddenly was just _there_. She met every one of Jaesa's blows with effortless repulsion, uncomplicated and simple. She didn't even try to hurt Jaesa. She only withstood her attack, until Jaesa finally and ridiculously dwindled into incapability, winded and defeated.

Jaesa stood there, gasping for air and staring at the Sith. The woman canted her dark head in Jaesa's direction for only a moment. Then she suddenly rushed forward, her lightsaber flaring scarlet for a single wild moment as it arced over Jaesa's head. Then it froze in place, inches from Jaesa's face, leaving her to gaze at it in stupefied amazement as it quivered its awful song hotly against the bridge of her own nose.

Then the Sith stepped back, pulling her saber away and sheathing it smoothly. Jaesa hung her head, shamed. "Just so … frustrating. Why can't I defeat you? Master Karr told me it was easy! That the Sith couldn't withstand the good side. Was it all … was it all lies? Everything?" Jaesa moaned.

The dark-haired man pulled Master Karr from his seat, yanking him towards them both. He collapsed to his knees next to Jaesa, looking up at her sorrowfully. "You haven't completed your training. When you've fully communed with the light side, no Sith could match you."

The Sith shook her head at him, "If that were so, then _you_ would've been able to match me. You yourself are a master of the light side, are you not? " Jaesa saw the truth of the Sith's words hit her old master and she ached.

But the Sith offered her the answer, the solution. It worked, it was the truth! It was! And Jaesa soaked it in, soothed finally. The Sith told her, "Jaesa, the Jedi offer you only illusions. They fight to defend a chaotic and disordered world. But they don’t offer control, so they struggle endlessly against their own nature. It makes them weak, lacking. They’re to be pitied, even destroyed. Before they do so much harm. _THAT_ is what I fight, _THAT_ is what I oppose. That arrogance that says we must sacrifice who and what we are, in order to accommodate some impossible ideal. Where everyone suffers at the mercy of a disorganized whole." She looked down at Nomen Karr's kneeling figure. "I want better than that, for me. For those I care about. And for you."

She was right. The sense of correctness filled Jaesa for the first time. It was like seeing a light come on after being shut away in a dark room for so long your eyes had begun to blur. Jaesa almost cried out at the rightness of the feeling, the glorious sensation of finally being freed from a lie. "Will you teach me how to keep my friends, my loved ones safe?  Will you show me, Sith?" Jaesa asked, using the force to reach out to her. Imploring her.

"Do you want me to, Jaesa?"

"Oh, yes. More than anything."

"Then I'll teach you."

Jaesa looked down at the man she'd once called master. “He used me, deceived me. Not like you.” Nomen Karr cried real tears as Jaesa’s blade destroyed him. She threw her head back, laughing. She was _finally_ free!


	50. A Lord of the Sith

Lusiel studied her new apprentice exactly. Jaesa Willsaam felt, to her, like a tiny bird just let loose from its nest for the very first time, twittering wildly in the wide open air. Waiting for some predator to munch heartily on her, no less. Lusiel sighed, considered how best to guide the girl into an appreciation for all the dangers present in such an incredible space. Hopefully before she was destroyed. What a waste that would be, she thought.

The first hurdle came even before they climbed on board the Black Wing. And it was blue.

Vette approached Jaesa without a single care or concern, just as they came through the airlock. The Twi’lek’s blue eyes were big and wide with curiosity, and not some small bit of humor. Lusiel imagined there was some joke just sitting there on the briefest edge of Vette’s tongue and fighting to rip free. But Jaesa was like a piece of fuel waiting for a flame before sparking into a conflagration.

Lusiel rather wanted to keep her Twi’lek in one piece, not sundered in pieces over the ship’s floors. It required a careful clipping of the new bird’s wings, anyway. Before the two squabbling children wrecked themselves in blatant rivalry, at least.

Jaesa tried sniffing, firstly. "Well, if I'm the apprentice here, what does that make you?"

"I’m just as blue after you walked in the door, as I was before. Not sure what you being an apprentice around here makes for any real difference where I’m concerned, at least,” Vette rolled her eyes.

“I don't understand.” Jaesa watched Lusiel from the corner of her eye, “You’re a slave, right? Am I required to direct you?" Quinn grunted the closest approximation to amusement he typically allowed, before moving past the two females to enter the bridge area. Jaesa frowned towards his back.

Vette ignored Quinn, though. She only focused on the newest member of the crew, rather. "Look, you’re new. So just understand there is really only one person on this ship who – ahem! – directs me. And that person isn't _you_.” Vette thumbed the air towards Lusiel, “Take it up with her if you have questions." Jaesa opened her mouth, as if prepared to respond. But Quinn emerged from the bridge.

“My lord, there’s an incoming holotransmission from Darth Baras …”

Lusiel sighed, “His timing is impeccable, as usual.” She waved her hand indifferently. Actually, just about everything in regards Darth Baras was a pain in the …

"I sensed Nomen Karr's death from across the galaxy, my apprentice." Baras' image was its normal, looming presence against the holoterminal. Lusiel stepped closer, crossed her arms over her chest as she stared back at him. Vette retreated to the doorway, standing nearby Quinn and nearly out of sight. But Jaesa was curious, crowded closer to Lusiel as she considered Baras’ masked visage. Lusiel subtly waved her back, to stand behind her. "I must admit, to be rid of him after all these years … it has unsettled me a bit."

Baras appeared _thoughtful_. Lusiel wondered if she was finally becoming so accustomed to the mask she could finally guage Baras' expressions regardless of the thing. Jaesa murmured to her quietly, “Master Karr _hated_ him.” Lusiel was amused, to find some small glimmer of agreement with a Jedi, of all things.

Lusiel leaned towards the holoterminal, "I did as I thought you’d want, master. Was I in error?"

"Not in the least, my apprentice." Baras seemed to be back to gloating, rather. "I am not wounded by this development. Merely bathing in the full breadth of its implications."

Lusiel grumbled, “I’d rather not witness you bathing, actually. Some torments should be preserved for more impact.” Baras scoffed what sounded almost like a laugh. Oh, he was in a good mood, if Lusiel’s humor didn’t needle his sensibilities. Lusiel felt relieved, placed her hand around Jaesa’s upper arm, “My own apprentice, master. Jaesa Willsaam.” The claim was heavy, real. Quinn took a single step forward, intent and watchful.

Baras turned an approving gaze onto Lusiel, then. He even seemed warm, inviting on the holoterminal. It was … disconcerting, and Lusiel scowled softly. "Indeed. Jaesa Willsaam will not be the last Sith to call you lord, but I’ll be the first to recognize it. You have earned the title, my own apprentice. You are a lord among us now."

Lusiel hesitated. She opted for a politic response, "You honor me." Lusiel actually resented the accolade from Darth Baras. As if he were some fatherly figure, bestowing a reward on her. But she carefully restrained her more intense feelings. Baras waved a hand as he concluded the transmission, “You will attend me, on Dromund Kaas. We have matters to discuss.” Lusiel shrugged. She would wager real money he needed her to do some other bit of work for him.

Vette pattered closer, "Wow. A Sith Lord. I'm impressed, truly. We going to celebrate before heading to Kaas City? I could get Toovee to make a cake." Vette actually rubbed her blue hands together.

Lusiel frowned at her, "We have cake? Since when?"

Quinn shook his head. "I don't believe I've programmed Toovee to make cake, my lord. Dessert is not my favorite part of a meal, after all. The droid can prepare cookies, however."

Lusiel laughed, "It's your lucky day, Jaesa. We have cookies!"

* * *

 

Jaesa was curious.

She was currently ensconced in one of the bench seats in the ship's lounge, replete from a meal the droid had put together. The food was delicious, a cut of boar meat basted in broth over a salad made of sea grass and cucumbers. And, yes, there were trays of warm, gooey cookies.

She appreciated her quarters, as well. The bed was small and narrow, quite brief. But there was a nice big cabinet for her things and it was private. Master Lusiel had also indicated she was free to appoint the room in any manner she liked. "Although I'll warn you to keep your decorating to your room. My captain seems to have a bit of a problem with décor that leaks outside of our private spaces," Lusiel said.

"I still want that apron back, dammit!" Vette had crowed.

All of which brought Jaesa's curiousity back full circle. She eyed Vette as the most likely source of answers at the moment. Master Lusiel had already retreated to her quarters, anyway, and Vette told her that Quinn was on the bridge at the front of the ship. The two young women were alone at the moment.

"Master Lusiel seems very friendly with you and the captain." Jaesa posed.

"Totally different from Quinn! He's a droid, even if he does have skin."

Jaesa was amused, "A droid, seriously?"

"Yep, don't let him fool you."

"Master Lusiel likes him, though."

"Oh, please. You’re not smarming me with your so-called intelligence just yet, not if _that’s_ the best observation you can make."


	51. Admiral Malcontent

Quinn was lying flat on his back, his legs extending out from underneath the ship's coolant system. His head was obscured under pipes and tubing that stretched up over the entire length of his torso. Vette sat nearby his feet, maintaining a constant twittering chatter that Quinn had long since blocked out as he yanked and manipulated various piping cylinders into their correct configuration.

"Vette. I need an arc welder," Quinn grunted, his voice muffled from under the machinery.

Vette fumbled through the tool box she dumped against her side, mumbling impishly, "Arc welder, arc welder … Maybe I used it on Toovee’s innards the last time I mucked around in his head … Got it!" She passed the tool into Quinn's hand that he reached out from under the machine, grinning madly when he loosed a wearied sigh.

Jaesa tumbled into the engine room right then, fairly tripping over a box full of metallic ship parts set nearby the doorway. Likely delivered during the ship’s most recent foray to the Imperial Fleet, where she followed Lusiel’s path through the markets and examined the various personnel with wide eyes. She had not thought to ask or help the tired-looking workers who carried the materials onto the Wing, nor even looked at where they placed the things.

Now she hopped and skipped in pained and embarrassed distress on one foot, clutching the toes of her other foot with her fingers. Vette shook with laughter, as she rolled along the floor by Quinn’s feet.

Jaesa considered some punishment she could levy against the Twi'lek – a twist to one of her tender lekku, a zap of electric shock on her backside, even a serious club upside her big, blue head. But she knew that her master would be displeased. For whatever strange reason, Lusiel seemed to like Vette. Jaesa couldn't quite understand the appeal, although Vette did have her uses.

Jaesa _did_ understand what Lusiel liked about Quinn. At least she thought she did, glancing down towards Quinn’s legs as they shifted back and forth along the floor. But Quinn had his own status in Lusiel's affection. One that literally screamed "Hands Off!" to her. So Jaesa stayed carefully mum on whatever brief interest she felt in regards the Imperial.

How did she best approach Lusiel, in regards those more physical of her desires, though? Lusiel insisted Jaesa should give vent to her passions, all of her strongest emotions. But the Jedi were adamantly opposed to overt or excessive behaviors involving anything like a romantic relationship, and Jaesa simply had no real experience with such things, regardless.

It would likely be best, to simply ask outright. Before she did something stupid. Like make an overture to the closest thing to a man on board the Wing and end up in the Med Bay afterwards. If she were lucky. Lusiel might send her flying straight out the airlock, rather. Considering the crimson of Lusiel’s normal aura, Jaesa rather doubted she would be lucky in the aftermath of such an offense.

Vette continued smirking at her, and Jaesa glared towards the twi’lek spitefully. Then she reconsidered, slowly scanning the twi’lek’s slight frame all garbed carefully in proper technician’s apparel as she worked over the ship’s engines. The small blue-skinned female giggled, “Better watch out for that box. It jumps out at you when you least expect it.”

Jaesa rolled her eyes, “Oh, that one truly stings. I’m so impressed. Truly! Can’t you tell?” Of all the people on board the ship, surely Vette could give her some pointers on how to entice masculine attentions. Maybe if she threatened her, somehow.

Quinn remained quiet as the two women argued, only continued his tinkering motions underneath the engines. He rarely paid attention to anyone that Jaesa had seen. Except for Lusiel. Everyone paid attention to her. Not the way Quinn did, however. No, Quinn watched Lusiel like she was a rich wine and he was a connoisseur of the stuff. Like he wanted to bury himself in her, just lose himself. He seemed to ache with it.

At first, Jaesa assumed his feelings were only so strong because Lusiel didn’t feel the same way. Except then she noticed Lusiel watched him just as much, and just as intently. She wanted him, too.

It was all so purely confounding, Jaesa thought. If Sith were able to explore their strongest feelings, their greatest passions – well, then why did Lusiel deny hers? It was baffling just watching them together.

Vette continued chuckling, "Yep, you’re obviously done in by the most simple puzzles. A single box just frustrates the crap out of you." Jaesa growled at her and Vette laughed even harder.

Quinn reprimanded them from underneath the coolant machinery, not even bothering to look, "Do not get blood anywhere in the engine room!" Vette grinned at Jaesa, sticking out her tongue to deliberately taunt her. Jaesa pantomimed kicking the twi'lek. But Vette only skirted sideways, so that Jaesa would kick Quinn rather. Jaesa lightly stomped her foot back down onto the floor, and Vette laughed _again_.

Jaesa sighed, explaining, "Captain Quinn, there's a transmission for you on the holo. Some old guy, in a uniform. He seems upset." Quinn mumbled something. Jaesa wasn't sure but she thought he said, "Not again."

Then Quinn scooted himself back out from underneath the machine. Jaesa watched as he moved to the sink nearby and scrubbed his hands and arms, then reached for his coat that had been hanging across one of the nearby venting pipes. How he managed to present such a duly appropriate appearance in mere moments was mind-boggling, and Jaesa gaped at him as he pulled his uniform into tidy place and marched out of the engine room.

Jaesa turned back to Vette after Quinn had gone, watched her return the tools they had used to work on the engines back into place all around the room. She asked the twi’lek, "So who's calling?"

"Oh please, let’s not talk about Broysc. It's headache enough we have to listen to him every time he’s on the holo."

* * *

 

The figure of Moff Broysc was slight, aging. He was hunched over a bit as he twitched and shook back and forth over the top of the holoterminal, and his voice as he screeched at them was raspy rather than forceful. Lusiel studied the little man with narrow judgment, watching the thick mustache covering his upper lip tremble as he pointed at her and yelled shrilly. Quinn mumbled to her as she stepped up to stand beside him, "These transmissions have increased. They're beginning to disrupt operations, my lord. He's nearly incoherent, as you can tell."

Quinn's frustration was intense. So Lusiel eyed the Moff critically, listening as he ranted. He didn’t seem to know where he was or who it was he was talking to, "Flew the coop! Your new cage will be smaller. And tighter! Coffin-sized. No smaller! I'll put you in a locket that hangs around my neck!" Broysc shook even harder as his agitation seemed to increase, "Druckenwell proved my point. The glory is mine! Mine! You're nobody!"

"It's unlikely he'll stop, my lord," Quinn rubbed his forehead wearily. “I hesitated to bring this to your attention, mind you. Except that the knowledge I have left Balmorra has further unstabilized the Moff’s slender grasp on reality. He seems to be completely mad.” Lusiel pressed her lips tightly closed, as she shuttered her memories and focused on the present.

"Vette tells me he’s communicated with the Wing on numerous occasions. What seems to be bothering him this time?"

"He's threatening to destroy Balmorra because I somehow ‘escaped’ the place, actually." Quinn was disgusted as Broysc snarled and jumped like a maddened gizka right over the holocommunication. He seemed to jump up and down right there in place, screeching, "Why did you transfer me, Radjnic? I see a Sith on this thing! Not the Admiral."

Lusiel glanced at Quinn, murmured questioningly, "Admiral?"

Quinn shrugged, "He calls me the ‘Admiral Malcontent.’ He seems to believe that's my actual rank and name." Lusiel’s mouth twisted into a slow grimace. Quinn looked away, before he embarrassed himself by staring too hard at the way her lips pouted prettily with anger.

Lusiel wagged her finger at the holotransmission. "Broysc, calm yourself!"

Moff Broysc glared back at her. "How dare you! Wait … You! It was _you_ who liberated the Admiral! Have you lost your mind? Don't you know it was because of him we lost the Battle of Talay?" Quinn sighed, explaining again. "Broysc's earliest command. Before I was born."

"It was his blunder that allowed the escaped Jedi to flee Taris before the bombardment!"

"Three hundred years ago, actually. _Broysc_ wasn't even born, then."

"He sabotaged the Glory Space Station, for crying out loud!"

"I have no idea what that is, my lord.”

Quinn anticipated Lusiel’s amusement, thought she might laughingly jeer at the Moff’s mind-numbing routine. But she seemed stiffly disapproving, rather. She only stood there, frozen and frowning up at the image of Broysc’ gross incompetence. Like a terribly proper Sith statue standing there, and she only said, "Broysc, you are unfit for command. I want you to resign."

"Oh ho, Sith! _I'm_ not unfit, just passionate about this … scourge … that threatens us all! Once it's eradicated, we'll all be fine! You! I order you to deliver him to me so that he can be executed!" Broysc stomped his skinny boot against the edging of his holoterminal, once and then twice. Lusiel wondered what other damage he made the men and women under his command had to typically repair, actually.

Lusiel shook her head, "No. You do not order _me_! You lunatic fool!"

"Then I accuse you alongside him! Radjnic, cut transmission! Cut it!"

Lusiel was disgusted. She was tempted to kick her own holoterminal, actually. But then she noticed Jaesa and Vette standing nearby, their mouths hanging open as they watched. She contented herself with a slow roll of her shoulders, as she sighed. _She_ would not lose control enough to descend into childish tantrums, at least. "Have you contacted Imperial High Command, captain? That man is unhinged."

"No one will confront Moff Broysc, no matter who I address. Too many powerful allies, too entrenched. No, he’s determined to serve, regardless of criticism or blunder." Quinn's gaze hardened. "And he will _never_ willingly step down. It's seems clear I must deal with Broysc myself."

Lusiel lifted her chin. This Broysc and his oh-so-powerful friends had managed to castigate her captain to Balmorra once before. She knew enough to read between the lines, to know that today wasn’t the first time the word execution had been tossed at Quinn’s face, though. She was Sith, and _no one_ threatened her people. "No. You will bring him to me." Quinn stared at her for a long moment, before nodding his head just once and marching smartly from the room.

She stood in front of the terminal long after Quinn had left her. Her mind swam with old memories – “ _He’s weak, failed! I told you! I told you to leave him, to just let him go! I’ll give you a new brother, once he’s gone_!” Blood, then. More ranting.  Then her brother was screaming, trying to just get away from her.  Lusiel shuddered lightly, as she remembered.  Madness plagued the weak. It stole the best of the strong, weakened the whole of them. Lusiel had no patience for it, whenever she saw it and knew it for what it was. She refused it utterly, in any shape it took.

Broysc wouldn't step down. So he’d die.

* * *

 

Vette heard the man’s yelling. She skittered down to the hold, just in time to see Quinn dragging Moff Broysc into the space. Vette recognized him, of course. Even if he was trussed and bound up like a wrapped sausage that Quinn tossed down against the floor. Vette giggled when Broysc took to flopping around there, kicking his thin legs and screeching, screeching and rolling back and forth along the floor.

He reminded her of a hard-shelled animal Nok Drayan had brought to Risha once from the planet Mon Calamar. He'd called the animal a turtle. When he threw it onto the floor at Risha's feet it landed on its back with its legs kicking futilely in the air, unable to right itself. Risha and Vette had spun the creature on its back for endless ages, giggling the entire while.

Vette almost asked Quinn if she could spin Broysc around like she had that long ago turtle. Make some new, sweet memories at least. But Quinn was watching as Lusiel entered the room right then, and he never even glanced at Vette. He only reached down and yanked the Moff up by the scruff of his jacket, shaking him slightly to make him aware of Lusiel's entrance.

Broysc began screaming when he saw Lusiel, “You … Sith! I’m commandeering this vessel, all this crew ! To contend with this Malcontent! Do you hear?” Vette snorted, along with Jaesa, who’d come down from the crew quarters when the shouting began. The two of them stood quietly waiting, their shoulders bumping impishly as they watched the show.

"Shut up, Broysc!" Lusiel slapped Broysc sharply, across one narrow cheek of his face and then the other. Broysc reared back and roared at her. Vette might have warned him, but she sensed how far removed from the events Lusiel really was. Broysc was a dead man already; he was just going about it a bit more loudly than the ones they normally mowed down, she thought.

"I'm a Moff, I command you! You! You'll do as I say, you and all your people! I'll kill you all, you'll all be executed!"

"You don’t threaten my people, lunatic!" Lusiel made to grab the Moff, to grip him with the Force and finally be done with him. But Quinn called to her, just before her power was let loose on the sodded fool.

“My lord!” Quinn glared at Broysc’ rolled-up figure with the utmost disdain, his nose curled with disgust, “I would gladly rid the Empire of this wasted figure. Like throwing trash out the airlock! Please!” Lusiel sighed.

"No! I'm a Moff! I am a Moff! You can't do anything to me!" Broysc began twitching as he rolled around even more, his agitation so greatly increasing Vette thought he was surely going to die of shock right then and there. She whispered sideways towards Jaesa, “Ugliest turtle in creation.”

Jaesa glanced at her, “What exactly is a turtle?”

But Quinn was snarling, "You're not a Moff any longer, Broysc!" Quinn thumped the man in the nose, sending Broysc’ head flying back to thud hard against the floor. Broysc yelped like a wounded Akk dog, before he began to cry. Vette goggled at the sight, then. Broysc cried as loudly as he did everything else, anyway.

"Just dispose of him, Quinn. I don't wish to regard him any further," Lusiel turned around on the heel of her softly-tooled leather boots and strode out from the room. Quinn murmured as she went, something respectful-sounding. But he didn’t look at her. Jaesa was the only one who leaned over slightly to watch as Lusiel left the hold and climbed the stairs to the upper decks.

Jaesa frowned, watching her go. Lusiel’s normally brilliant red aura was tinged gray, like it was pockmarked with soot, or grit. Like something had smudged up against her, and left a bruise in its wake. Jaesa sensed her master was far more disturbed by the events than anyone really understood. Perhaps she should mention something to …

Quinn used his blaster, held tightly against the side Broysc’ temple as Quinn held his head down with one boot pressed hard into his neck. Broysc wheezed out a single breath as he died, his blood flashing in a single splat up against the floor. Quinn grimaced, and palmed his personal weapon as he turned around to direct them both, “These tiles of flooring should be easily replaced. Send all the debris out with the waste drop this afternoon. All of it.” He idly toed Broysc’s shattered figure on the floor.

Vette sighed, “It was so much better when he still looked like a skinny turtle. Now he’s just another mess to clean up.”


	52. My Own Malavai

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter is very explicit. Heads-up, then, if you would rather bypass overt details of sexual content.

_Oily whispers against the back of her skull, darkest tendrils reaching for her … Khy’s eyes, big in his face as he reached out for her and called to her, “Lou!” Blood that flashed past her eyes and her mother’s screaming, the madness ripping, “I hate you! I hate you! Just go away!”_

_“Lou!”_

* * *

 

 

The scream ripped through the ship, this wild and piercing thing that terrified with a purest edge. It was sharp and pointed -- _scared_. Quinn plunged from the bridge, rushing into the lounge and quickly counting each one of the crew there. Toovee was warbling, "Oh my," while Vette and Jaesa looked over at him from the doorways of their quarters. But Lusiel was conspicuously absent.

Quinn rushed towards the door to Lusiel's quarters, the ones set closest to the bridge. He always derived such comfort from knowing she was so near to him whenever he worked, actually. That she was only steps away from the bridge, sleeping nearby. Now he only resented it, that close as he was he couldn’t reach her any faster.

He refused to call the feeling ripping through him fear. It was _worry_. Concern, maybe. Concern was the best word, Quinn told himself. But he didn't really believe that. All of his mental doors were blasting open and all he could really think, logically, was that he'd never before heard Lusiel scream. That was what happened to turn his concern into something harder, heavier. He just didn't name it.

Jaesa was talking, "Oh, yea.  I totally forgot. She was pretty upset earlier, I sensed it."

Quinn banged his fist against the door, not looking at Jaesa as he confronted her so sharply, “Why didn’t you _say_ something?”

"Who would I have said something to?"

Vette laid a hand against Jaesa's elbow. She figured Quinn looked ready enough to shoot Lusiel’s apprentice with more than some pointed criticisms right then. "Always talk to Quinn about things like that. He's the resident doctor, here."

Jaesa looked at Quinn, her brow upraised, "Is there anything you don't do around here? Engines, droids, tidying .."

"Right, because he isn’t arrogant enough already, sheesh," Vette rolled her eyes.

Quinn blocked them from his attention entirely, then. He stopped banging on Lusiel's door and started working the lock himself, rather. He idly noted how simple it was, to manipulate the security on the door and thought it imperative he redress the weakness at some point. But later, later. The door swung open after only a moment and the light shined into the room in one wide swath, immediately illuminating the bed. Quinn stepped inside, speaking quickly over his shoulder, "I'll assist her."

He heard Vette, "Okay, Jaesa. Back to bed, g'night." Then the door closed. Quinn could still see her there on the bed, the pale red glow of the nighttime illumination ringing the room showing her to him in brilliant, soft glory. He breathed in slowly as he regarded her, gathering himself. He spoke to her softly, softly, "Lusiel?"

Lusiel was huddled into a shaking ball, practically hugging herself as she curled tightly in the very center of the bed. She was naked, her pale skin gleaming with sweat. Her face was buried in her arms where they wrapped around her knees. She was making small gasping sounds. Quinn wanted to scream himself just watching her. Then she whispered his own name, “Malavai."  Like he was a blasted gift of some kind.

Quinn closed his eyes. He toed off his boots and tugged his coat off his shoulders, climbing up onto the bed once he was down to just his shirt and trousers. He carefully maneuvered himself until his legs laid along either side of Lusiel's form. And then he pulled her into his arms, holding her back against his front with his head tucked aside her own so their jaws could brush gently together. "What's wrong?" He whispered to her.

Lusiel sighed, "A bad dream. How silly is that? A Sith who has a bad dream, like an absurd child afraid of a bogeyman."

Quinn shrugged, and Lusiel felt the pull and twist of his chest against her back, the rhythm of his breathing along the very top of her spine. Tingles of sensation left her shivering lightly with pleasure. He blew gently against the back of her ear, "Tell me about your dream. Let me battle your monsters with you. I might even help."

She puffed the smallest laugh, then hiccupped. Then she told him, almost breathlessly quiet, "My mother. She wanted me to kill my brother, whispered and cajoled. She promised me rewards, if only I would push him or drown him or … something, anything. She wanted me to _hurt_ him, though." Lusiel fingered the fringes of the blanket that covered her bed in grey and black stripes, “I knew that she hated him for so long, but I always believed my father would keep us both safe. Then she killed my father, and I realized I was the only one strong enough, powerful enough.”

Quinn frowned, "I thought she killed herself, rather."

Lusiel inhaled roughly, "Mother was completely mad, insane right then. I’m not sure she even realized what she’d done, not until it was over. She saw me standing there. She just screamed and screamed, so loud. There was blood all over her face, her chest and gown. She turned around and ran at the window, burst through it. She fell hundreds of stories, screaming the whole way down … just forever." Lusiel sighed, “I _wanted_ to kill her. I would have. She stole even that from me.”

He was quiet for a moment, thinking over what she’d said, how much it conveyed of the way that she considered all of them, the people she gathered around her. Then he murmured, "And I brought a madman here today."

"This has nothing to do with Broysc, Quinn. Nothing."

"But to see and hear madness like that all over again … Lusiel." Quinn felt the offense of the thing, the way the day’s events struck at her very core. It ached in him, the thrilling desire to ease her, comfort her.

Lusiel shrugged. She smiled into the shadowed dark of the room, snuggled closer against him, "It’s brought you inside my quarters at last. I quite like that much, at least. Perhaps I should have more bad dreams, just to keep you here."

Quinn rubbed his jaw in gentle strokes against Lusiel's, shook his head, “No more bad dreams. Not tonight.” It tickled her, feeling the soft stubble of his masculine cheek along her own. She quivered, chuckling softly into the darkness. She leaned her head back, letting it rest against his shoulder so she could hear his heart beating into a rapid tattoo under her ear. Then she whispered to him, "You’re wearing more clothes than I am."

He smiled at her teasing, "I wasn't certain how you'd feel if I took them all off before I held you."

Lusiel turned, coming to her knees in front of Quinn. “Perhaps I should show you, then. How I feel, I mean.” She sat there for several seconds, just staring at him. He looked at her, sliding his gaze down. Her sweetly perfect breasts were trembling with desire above the soft, muscled lines of her belly. He could just make out the shadowed curve of her sex, the dark curls there barely visible.

Lusiel watched his eyes as he looked at her, watched them darken to almost blue-black, fiery with thrilling passion. To be wanted like that, so badly it almost hurt … she smiled at him, arching her back slightly so her breasts thrust out towards him. Inviting him to touch her bareness, to hold her. His gaze shot back up to hers as he groaned. She chuckled again and then reached for the hem of his white shirt.

Quinn raised his arms, felt her hands slide along his sides as she pushed the shirt up, up and over his head. Then she was looking at him, running her dark gaze down his chest, taking in his muscled frame. The lines of his firm torso, the lean fitness he kept so much shaped with careful calisthenics routines in the hold down below. The utterly masculine form she’d wanted for so long, desired and fantasized over; letting the anticipation build, build.

Now her hands followed the trek of her eyes, running through the brief springy hair on his chest and down over his stomach, until she reached the fastening of his pants. He came to his knees, even as she pulled and yanked at the opening, tugging the fabric loose and down to bare his groin and buttocks. He pulled his legs free, as Lusiel reached around him to clutch at the globes of his rear. She pulled him, hugged him against herself so that his erection nestled in the hollowed curves of her own breasts and rubbed there.

He let his head fall back as he moved against her breasts in gentle rocking motions, felt himself grow even harder if it was possible. He reached for her with both hands, held her head within the span of his fingers as he bent towards her mouth, seized her lips with his own and thrust his tongue inside her. Back and forth, penetrating her. And she welcomed him, ran her fingers along the curve of his spine. Her touch sparked against the muscles of his back, tingled through him. Sith, he thought, remembered she was Sith. And he groaned harshly into her mouth.

He pushed her back until she was completely prone, her head facing the foot of the bed. He knelt between her knees, lifting her legs to balance her thighs on his before he leaned over to take one of her nipples into his mouth. He rolled the bud against his tongue, softly nipping at it, even as he palmed and plucked against its twin. He played with her breasts for long, endless moments, running his mouth back and forth between them, and sweeping his tongue along the sensitive skin under both the small, plump mounds.

Lusiel moaned, clutching at the back of Quinn's head and running her fingers through his hair as he feasted on her body. She ran her feet up to clasp him around his buttocks, pulling him closer to her. He settled himself into the hollow of her hips, rubbed the very head of his cock just against her opening so gently, listened to her as she began chanting, "Yes. Yes. Malavai."

He groaned again. He leaned down to whisper into her ear, "I _love_ it when you say my name." Love. Such a forbidden word, that trembled there against the dark. Slowly shook them, the world around them.

She opened her eyes to look up at him suspended there above her, his arms stretched out and balanced on the bed along either side of her shoulders. He was watching her as he began pushing inside of her, felt her inner warmth clasp him, clutch him, and draw him in. His eyes blazed blue down at her, and she moaned at the stroking feel of him coming inside her.

Both of them groaned loudly when he finally settled himself all the way inside, enough he could feel the soft opening of her cervix clutching at the head of his cock in little kissing sensations. She reared up to hold him around the neck, to clasp him in her arms. He felt the brush of her lips across his jaw, her tongue skittering over the lobe of his ear as she whispered, "Malavai … now, Malavai. Malavai.” It made him moan loudly, his name whispered like that. Like she claimed _him_. Like he was hers.

He raised himself above her once again, bracing himself with his arms on the bed beneath her. And he began to move; thrusting his hips back and forth so that his cock ran in and out of her channel in steady, smooth glides of pure sensation. He pushed his knees forward, thrusting her hips up higher. So he could reach deeper inside of her, and Lusiel cried out a wild keening cry of delight. He gradually sped up his thrusts, felt his hips pounding against her buttocks, cradling her.

He reached out with one arm to clutch at her torso, pulling her up and against his chest so that he could feel her breasts rubbing back and forth against him. Their bodies became damp, glistening with sweat. They slid slickly against each other, both of them panting. He could feel her tightening around him, her inner muscles clenching at him, and he cried out, "Yes, Lusiel! Now! Let me feel it! Come on me, right now!" And Lusiel exploded, sobbing her satisfaction against his shoulder as she rippled with the pleasure.

He growled, felt his scrotum tightening as his orgasm approached. He settled her back against the bed again, thrust himself into her. Once, again, again. And then again, just before the satisfaction washed over him. He pushed into her one last time, held himself still and deep, and poured his passion into her. Quinn moaned her name, listened to it echo in the dark as he finally collapsed alongside her onto the bed. He lay there, breathing roughly and then he pulled her up against him so he could feel her, hear her breathing as he panted into calm again. They lay there, holding each other, quietly drifting.

She whispered to him, drowsy and sated, "You helped. My own Quinn. Mine.” He tightened his arms as she slowly fell back to sleep, felt the drag of weariness against his own form. He just held onto her.  He just loved her, and he fell asleep.


	53. Training the Apprentice

"You'll sever your own damned foot if you don't concentrate on what you're doing, Jaesa!" Lusiel stepped back from their sparring match, smoothly retracting her lightsaber as she eyed her apprentice critically.

Jaesa was breathing hard, frustrated. Fighting Lusiel always made her feel like she was throwing herself hard against a real wall. Repeatedly. She was invariably left unfulfilled, unsatisfied. She only knew, that the first time she actually struck Lusiel would require a medal, a reward – a party! For now, she snarled at her master instead, "I'm trying!"

But Lusiel huffed an irritated sound and turned her back on the younger woman, utterly unafraid of her, "I'm in a good mood so I won’t leave you a scar today, to remember how important it is to focus your mind on what you’re actually doing! Be glad!" She held her hand up when Jaesa protested, "No. Press my patience with your complete ineptitude even a little more today, and I really will hurt you. Instead, you will tell me about the book I asked you to read."

Together, the two women sank into a more meditative stance, kneeling side by side in the center of the lounge. They were alone. Vette typically retreated from the space ever since Lusiel started using the area to train her apprentice, declaring she knew better than to get in the way of any sort of Sith _instruction_. "I’d probably end up doing the teaching. As an example, mind you," she had half-jokingly twittered.  Jaesa would have rather she'd stayed close, if only to "accidently" bump her with a lightsaber at one point, or another.

Jaesa groused as she flung herself down next to Lusiel with her knees gathered underneath her, "It was a journal, master. Written by a minor Jedi, some woman I’d never even heard of, in fact. The book was so boring."

Lusiel lowered her dark head, closed her eyes. To better ignore her apprentice’s temperamental tantrum, of course. "Yet it’s possible to glean such interesting details from the most unlikely sources. You only have to listen, keep your mind open to anything, to any sensation or idea or feeling. The Jedi close themselves off, it’s part of their weakness."

"Oh." Jaesa pondered, “What of those who can’t use the Force, though? What possible value can be gleaned from _them_?” She was thinking of Vette, really. Although it suddenly occurred to her Lusiel may have some _uses_ for men who couldn’t use the Force, snidely considering how often they’d discovered Quinn emerging from Lusiel’s quarters in the early morning hours ever since Broysc was executed.

But Lusiel was quiet for long moments. Jaesa glanced at her, saw a slight frown knitting her brow into a curved line. She realized her Sith master was growing angry, felt a slight twinge of fear titter along her spine and quailed there in her huddled position on the floor. Now Lusiel murmured to her, dangerously low, “It’s been my experience, that the most dangerous enemies you’ll face are the ones you utterly underestimate, Jaesa. I have known men who could slice you into tiny pieces without ever using a single touch of Force compulsion, and long before you even knew they were there. Believe me. The _simplest_ blade can just as easily destroy you, when you’re that much a fool.”

Jaesa wondered about them, those men Lusiel saw in her mind’s eye right then. That she respected them, as if they were just as worthy as any Sith – that was obvious. Jaesa bit her lip before she stupidly asked about them, though. "The Jedi woman, then … Well, she didn't seem particularly talented, I guess. Most of her abilities seemed average enough. She tossed things, rocks mostly. She had some skill with healing and much of her journal was taken up describing her work in various clinics."

Lusiel nodded, listening as her mind drifted.

"The only remarkable ability she mentioned, in fact, had to do with the real force bonds she created intermittently with other Jedi. It seemed an innate talent, something she did without conscious or willful thought. She could actually take on some of the talents of those Jedi she bonded with, at least for short periods, in fact."

Lusiel opened her eyes. But she kept her gaze centered down at the floor, rather than turn fully to look at Jaesa with half the fascination that filled her right then. "She doesn't describe _how_ she accomplished such a thing?"

"She wrote, 'it just happens, without plan or consideration.’ That’s all she says, my lord," Jaesa answered, struggling to still her mind from its turmoil. How Lusiel seemed able to calm herself so easily and quickly never ceased to amaze her. Her Jedi masters demonstrated similar mastery, too. Was it a matter of age or experience, then? But Lusiel was only a little older than her, barely a year even! Jaesa felt frustrated.

"I see. Such an ability could be useful." Lusiel said, apparently thinking aloud. “Study the Jedi’s book, Jaesa. I want to know more about force bonds, every bit of knowledge about them. Seek out similar writings, even.”

"If you want me to, of course." But Jaesa’s attention was already moving past Lusiel’s curiosity. Disappointing, actually. Lusiel depended on insight; she shrewdly examined every detail and piece of information regarding those in power near her, around her. _Knowing_ them, knowing what was important to them, what they wanted or needed – that was the most certain weapon Lusiel ever brought to bear against an enemy, or even a potential enemy. It was understanding them, above all else.

Jaesa’s indifference, her disregard for whatever compelled Lusiel to fathom such bonds was frustrating. But Lusiel only asked her, "What's on your mind, Jaesa?" An apprentice who stayed so dutifully blind was far less worrisome a threat, Lusiel thought.

Jaesa exhaled abruptly, loudly. Like she’d been waiting for the merest opening, just to speak. And now everything would spill out in a blatant rush of humming excitement, maybe. Lusiel bit her lip, to keep from laughing at her.

“Oh, I don’t even know where to start! I've only touched the dark side, and it already feels like everything -- all of it is just _there_! Like the galaxy itself is finally unfurling right in front of me, and it’s almost overwhelming. There's just so much to take in! I always felt kept and confined, having to watch what I say and feel, and suddenly I’m free. I want to express … everything that I’m feeling."

Lusiel pushed one of the tendrils of her hair that had snaked forward onto her temple back, tucked the fringe into control of the bun against her nape, nodding towards Jaesa, "The power of the Force is found in our emotions. So letting our feelings flow freely makes us stronger, unlocks our potential."

"That’s what I’m hoping for the most, master," Jaesa asserted. She paused, abashed, "So can I ask you something?" _Here it is_ , Lusiel thought. She gestured an assent, watching Jaesa closely.

"Right, then. So the Jedi kept me stifled.” Jaesa fidgeted against the floor, so that the folds of her robes scratched across the surface. “That meant _romantic_ interactions were strictly forbidden. Is that the case for Sith, too? I want …” Jaesa looked away, her voice trailing off as a blush crawled up her neck. Lusiel shook her head, biting her lip hard enough she thought surely there would be blood in her mouth before the morning session was finally concluded.

Like she was a taskmaster who’d rap the girl’s knuckles, just for reaching into the cookie jar! Lusiel wanted to laugh, myself, “I’ve already required you to seek out a full range of sensations and emotions, Jaesa. By all means." Then Lusiel's gaze hardened, "Stay away from Quinn, Jaesa."

Jaesa swallowed. She had been a fool when she assumed Lusiel did not know how Jaesa was feeling. She murmured quietly, “I know he's yours, master."

Lusiel closed her eyes again, "Tell me more about the Jedi who made force bonds."


	54. The Order is Given

"I'm starting to feel Nar Shaddaa is running on a repeat-function through the holo. I keep finding myself back here once again. And it stinks every time," Lusiel complained, emerging from the spaceport into the rancid air of Nar Shaddaa. Again.

"Indeed. Perhaps it’s the appeal the place holds for those various traitors and scum the Empire despises, however," Quinn grumbled as he followed her. The wash of colors from the lights and tinging advertisements against Lusiel’s dark-haired head was alluring, at least. She seemed to be almost glowing as he strode behind her, and he drank in the showy sensation she was to him like it was a liquor to imbibe.

"It’s why we’re here this time around, at least," Lusiel glanced at her companion, smiling teased him. "We could try and hide out overnight, after we're finished. I know a place."

There was a burst of jealous energy from her captain, then. Lusiel stopped in place, staring at him. But Quinn only looked at the glittering poster hanging against the nearby wall, depicting the freakish form of a Weequay character in the latest holographic thriller produced by Plescinia Entertainments, posed sideways with a blaster pistol held up in threat. Not Quinn’s favorite form of holo entertainment, by far. He veered more towards stories of dashing spies and intricate puzzles, rather.

It took Lusiel a long moment to understand what bothered Quinn so much and then she wanted to laugh. If she were particularly cruel, she would tease him even further. Maybe promise him she would keep her armor on this time. But she bit back the temptation. Mostly because she didn’t want him to know she was completely aware he monitored her movements. He might try secreting new devices among her items and gear, if she did that.

Besides. She really wanted to toss her armor aside before tumbling with Quinn into one of the beds here on Nar Shaddaa.   She didn't want to injure him. At least not _seriously_. Bites or nips were acceptable. Lusiel shuddered as she imagined marking his neck with little love bruises. Oh, he could mark _her_ neck, even better! She almost pulled him into the alcove just behind the absurd poster, to have him do it right then and there.

Quinn staidly remarked to her, before moving off towards the taxi platform again, "I am not sure it would be wise to leave Vette and Jaesa alone on the ship that long." Lusiel chuckled as she sauntered after him.

"Indeed. We shouldn’t leave the kiddies home alone, not for too long at least. How about only a couple of hours, though?” Lusiel settled against the bench seat of the taxi, watched Quinn climb in opposite her. “I was quite bored the last time I visited Nar Shaddaa. I only managed to visit some of the shops. All by myself no less. Vette was attending some sort of celebration with her sister."

Lusiel smiled to herself as Quinn's relief became achingly palpable, like a warm blanket that settled between them. His voice was husky and rich with it as he responded, "I'm sure that would be acceptable, my lord."

"I sincerely hope it proves more than ‘acceptable’ in the end, Quinn," Lusiel laughed as they reached the lower industrial sector of the city. It was such a simple thing to please him, she thought. It only took the reassurance she didn’t spend a few hours in bed with a stranger the last time she ventured to Nar Shaddaa, just the smallest nudge.

Lusiel was still purely satisfied with herself as they ambled around a corner. A minor squad of Republic soldiers loitered outside the doorway at the end of that alley, just outside the safehouse where General Karastace Gonn was secreting Imperials planning to defect to the Republic. Traitors intent on moving outside the purview of the Empire’s control, giving up the Empire's strength to their own enemies – the fools. Lusiel breathed in steadily, just before launching herself at the men. They didn’t manage a single shouted warning before her saber’s swipe brushed them down onto the floor, and they only warbled as she finished them furiously fast.

This could very well be the best trip to Nar Shaddaa she had ever made, Lusiel thought to herself as she stalked inside the house.

* * *

 

It had been far too long a time since he stepped on the capital homeworld, Quinn thought as he followed Lusiel into Darth Baras' chambers. The air was heavy with power and presence, the might of the Empire intense all around them. Something that all Imperials should appreciate routinely, so they never forgot what they fought and served for – the power and control of their mightiest.

Lusiel paused in the doorway of Baras' rooms, blatantly listening to the holotransmission Darth Baras was monitoring just then. The deference he paid the Sith who's image was displayed was obvious and heady, and she studied the figure carefully.

The master of her own master … Darth Vengean was ghostly pale, his face and skin ravaged by the darkest side of the Force and his eyes gleamed brightly red as he glared out at Baras. Lusiel knew that Vengean’s rage and anger focused on war, that he descended into the worst ravages of battle to achieve his own mastery. He stalked his opponents in the field with ruthless brutality, once crushed a man under the weight of his own Force power like smashing a bug.

Of course he would command the Sphere of Conquest and Offense, pressing the Dark Council to war against the Republic without stop or pause. He took the Treaty of Coruscant as if it was some sort of personal insult, so much he whispered malcontent against the Emperor himself. It was a mark of Vengean’s own power he wasn’t destroyed, as a result.

Quinn saw Lusiel glance back at him and he dropped his head, only subtly acknowledging her command of him. She would be focused on tact, a politic display here. It depended on careful maneuvering, and manipulations. Lies, even. Quinn approved. Lusiel's clarity, focus and intelligence was never more on display than when she interacted with her fellow Sith. Like watching her during the melee attacks that she made, perhaps. Like she was dancing - a smooth fluidity of motion, colorful and brilliant and powerful, that made deliberate, ultimate victory.

"Was it you, Baras? Did you destroy General Gonn?" Vengean demanded, his red eyes cold as crystal as he watched Baras. But Baras did not quail or flinch back from his master. Like a pudgy blot, Baras straightened to stiffest affront just standing there.

"Of course I did, my lord! Just as you wanted, the fringe systems are now ripe for the taking! We only have to act!"

Darth Vengean rasped with satisfaction. Lusiel rather wondered how much of his lungs were as gray and faltering as his face, actually. But his power arched from his gaze with every flicker of his eyes. His power was obvious. He was pleased right then, though, "Finally. Now the Council won’t be able to remain passive any longer. They’ll see – war is the only answer! You’ve done it, Baras … you’ve given me what I craved the very most." And then Lusiel stepped forward, her boots plodding against the floor as she approached them both in front of the holoterminal. She bowed her head, "Pardon the interruption, my lords."

Darth Vengean frowned down at her, as Lusiel slipped into place alongside Darth Baras. She looked tiny, ephemeral and feminine both. Like the darkest little butterfly, maybe. The prettiest wings outstretched and glorious. Vengean was not fool enough to deny her strength, though. He still bore a long, wickedly carving scar over the lean length of his stomach, put there by a particularly lovely woman who seduced and loved him right before delivering the blow that made the wound. _This_ female intrigued him. Vengean breathed roughly, "Who is this, Baras?”

"My mightiest apprentice, my lord. She’s the one who killed General Gonn, hunted him down on Nar Shadda and destroyed him," Baras intoned. Rotely, like he wanted to keep Lusiel far from sight and understanding, rather.

Of course she would be Baras' enforcer, Vengean thought. Stories of her achievements were already bubbling through the Citadel, whispers of her nature and her steps. Marr spoke her _name_ , even. This was a Sith who would take up the word great as her own, and challenge anyone who stood in her way to doing it.

She would rightly terrify Baras. Vengean eyed him shrewdly, surmising his intentions. He would already be angling to deny the younger Sith so much power, would blindly, stupidly squander her potential utterly for fear she might take him. But Vengean himself did not fear her in the slightest, would not fear her ever. There was a natural order and process to the universe, and that the young should eventually overtake the old was proper enough. If this brash youngster proved strong enough – then Baras would fall. It was so simple as that.

How very much a fascinating development, Vengean thought.

Lusiel dropped down to kneel in front of the holoterminal, bowing her head in grave respect. Behind her, an Imperial officer dutifully followed suit. Obviously her own man, Vengean surmised. He murmured with approval, "Clearly a minion who well knows the meaning of respect, then.” He blatantly ignored Quinn. The lack of Force in the officer made him meaningless. “Then rise, young one. You’ve served your master and your master’s master both. And well, too."

"It is my privilege, master," Lusiel lifted her chin. She was proud, of course. Strength always made pride and personal esteem so much more real. But Vengean only saw the proud tilt of her face, the firm turn of her shoulders and the solid step of her boots as she raised herself back to standing. Everything else – her deepest emotions and strongest impulses – those were secreted behind the toughest barriers in her own mind, held there so he couldn’t see her, couldn’t find her.

The sheer strength of her ability to keep his Force senses blind to her was purely impressive. Vengean was utterly satisfied. Baras was _already_ too late. He murmured, "I'm impressed with your choice of apprentice, Baras." He threw back his shoulders, regarding the both of his followers. "It's time. I will send my destroyer to the fringe systems and they will be mine before anyone is the wiser. The order is given, Baras. Enact Plan Zero. Vengean out."

Baras let loose a hum of satisfaction as Vengean's image faded. He looked like a fat cat that just swallowed a plump mouse, and he purred, "Excellent. I’ve waited such a long time for this opportunity and now it’s here.” Baras flexed his fingers as he explained, “Plan Zero is the systematic elimination of the Republic's top military leaders. A preemptive strike that will leave the Republic headless." Lusiel considered him, the plans within plans she could see percolating in his toady brain. She would have to position her own self carefully, just to find her way through whatever web Baras was methodically weaving. At least before it snared her in place.

Quinn worked against the surface of his datapad, his fingers flying fast as he calculated the necessary motions of Lusiel’s course in this newest strategical mission. Plan Zero … Baras’ directives had to be followed exactly, he thought. Baras hummed as Quinn worked, "You continue to utilize Quinn, apprentice. Good. He'll be a valuable asset when you reach Taris. Use him well."

Baras’ senses fingered Quinn’s state of mind, his emotions and drive right then. Lusiel remained impervious, not like Quinn. The Imperial regarded Lusiel passionately, his admiration and care of her was intensely powerful. Baras was gratified. The more enmeshed the man was, the easier it was to prod and control him. Knowing what could compel him, what threats to bring to bear on him … Baras always tried to know what flaws or faults could be used against his own tools, and if Quinn believed Lusiel was threatened somehow he could be simply and terribly directed.

But Quinn _was_ an advantage for Lusiel in the meantime. His skills were immense, regardless of his lack of Force ability. Perhaps it would be wiser to destroy him now, rather than allow her to further gain and benefit from the man. Baras pondered.

Then Lusiel leaned forward. She sensed the risk, like a ripple of eddying water from a predator moving beneath the surface. So she slapped back against it, interjecting, "Yes, my master. I have a high regard for Quinn's capabilities. He's an exemplary officer, an ideal far more in the Imperial military should aspire to." Lusiel was adamantly protective as she pressed him back from the threat, and Baras almost crowed gleefully. Her most appalling weakness was on display, and he wanted to gloat. She sniffed, gesturing towards Quinn as she turned to leave the room.

Baras watched them move out of the doors. Let them work together to see Plan Zero enacted. Let her have her last days with him. Soon enough, Baras thought, it would be too late. Very soon, he'd finally destroy her.


	55. Sith are like Nexu

In Pierce's mind, Sith were dangerous beasts, in the compelling, beautiful way a Nexu looked as it leaped upon its prey – a gorgeously wild, untamed creature you avoided unless you wanted your face chewed off, basically. Of course, Sith were usually not so pretty as a Nexu. They took hits enough their bodies suffered greatly, leaving them with cracking skin, twisted eyes, and false flesh. Bits of metal a lot of the time, to boot.

Yea, surely the Sith Moff Hurdenn described would be one of those, Pierce thought. Stupid Hurdenn, who kept rushing around the room _preparing_. Bumbling idiot of an officer said the Sith was some incredible warrior, the sort that charged headlong into battle bolstered with little but nerve and determination. Well, and that magical doohickey they tossed around so often, too, he supposed. Didn’t really matter, not to Pierce. He still thought a Sith like that would be misshapen and awry. Maybe he’d be deformed somehow, marked with a cybernetic limb perhaps. Or two, even.

But he was wrong.

Lord Lusiel Phyre proved far more like the sleekly beautiful Nexu than any Sith in Pierce’s experience. She was slim and stunning, in a dark and captivating sort of way. It’s why Pierce stayed so quiet and watched her as the Moff proceeded to fawn all over her - practically drooling, the ass! He just waited for her to swipe out at Hurdenn with a vicious claw, so that the Moff's absurdly large head would bounce off and across the floor. Eyeing her lightsaber, where it hung against her side in pure, appealing threat, he figured she was more than capable of the show.

She provided him the best moment of every blasted month he’d devoted to the stinking planet of Taris, too. It came when Hurdenn offered Pierce's service to the Sith, fully expecting her to disdain him as over-burly and useless muscle, only. Maybe he thought she'd just toss the chance of using Pierce right back into his face. More likely, Hurdenn imagined she would demand _more_ service, justifying Hurdenn’s own participation in the Sith’s mission on the world.

Lord Lusiel didn’t even blink, though. She just turned those big, gorgeous brown eyes towards him – a man could fucking drown in eyes like that! – and she announced, "Lieutenant, your service to me begins immediately."

Pierce felt himself harden into stiff readiness, as anticipation boiled in his veins. Leastwise Hurdeen got that much about the Sith correct. Because she didn’t mollycoddle about the way, just got right down to the business of taking charge. Pierce envisioned the combat, the battle the Sith would lead him into and through, and he was ecstatic. Nothing stirred Pierce more than the promise of real action.

Pierce practically gloated when Lord Lusiel waved Hurdenn off from the room, then. She wasn’t even polite about it. Woman just pointed to the doors, “Out, Hurdenn. I require this space with my officers.” Pierce smirked towards the Moff’s backside as he stomped childishly through the doors.

And then Pierce was proved right, even more than Hurdenn. He'd anticipated the Sith was coming to Taris in search of the War Trust generals, anyway. Only because they were the biggest threat on the planet at the moment. Why else would such a fucking-ass powerful Sith venture to a backwater mess of a world like Taris, heh? Pierce practically bragged his report as Lord Lusiel leaned over the war table to consider the maps and intelligence reports, "Got my hands on a Republic scout. Leaned on him, hard. He was setting up supply routes for General Frelka, the War Trust's junior member."

The man standing behind the Sith suddenly leaned forward, addressing her, "We should speak to the scout, my lord. It would be beneficial to know what sort of supplies the Trust is using or in need of." The fellow was obviously an Imperial officer, Pierce thought. His coat and leathered trousers were standard Imperical cut and style, even if they were fashioned for field work and thick. He probably didn't want to get blood on one of his more fancy uniforms, what with his pretty hair and dandified airs.

The Sith nodded, though. She turned to Pierce, pointing, "My captain is correct.  I would like to interrogate the scout personally."

Damn it to Hells, Pierce thought. But he didn’t beat around the bush, either. Just stated it straight-out, "He's dead. Sorry."

That fine Imperial officer of hers shifted, frowned. Pierce noted the man’s eyes were glacial blue, as he looked at him with sheer reproach. Fuck you, he wanted to spit at the captain. Pierce ignored him in favor of the Sith Lord who kept turning his stones hard, instead. Lord Lusiel just leaned back on her heels, regarding Pierce critically, "Leave the interrogation to those more capable next time, lieutenant."

Ah, Hell. Even when she reprimanded a man, the woman was fucking gorgeous. Pierce nodded, "Noted. I did scope the area the scout described. Several heavily armed Republic supply caravans run along carefully staggered routes. Only need a couple dozen soldiers. They hit the caravans and pull their transponders; then we triangulate their destination with the equipment here. Moff Hurdenn can't spare the manpower, though."

The Sith shrugged, “I don’t require a couple dozen foot soldiers.” Pierce ran his eyes down her frame quickly. She looked rather small, actually. And curved deliciously in just the right places, too. But she radiated significant power and confidence. He didn't really doubt her, not completely. He just wished he could watch her go at it, though.

"Guess that means I'm running the tech here," Pierce almost whined plaintively. He thought he saw the Sith's lip give a little twitch, but he could be wrong. Did Sith ever laugh, he wondered. He'd never heard that they had any real sense of humor. Well, this was a Sith who seemed perfectly able to contradict his preconceptions galore. What's one more? He held up a datapad, "Here are the coordinates. Caravans run daily but they vary the timing. I'm sure you'll come upon them eventually."

The Sith turned and handed the datapad to her dark-haired dandy of an officer. Pierce watched as the captain recorded the information oh-so-precisely into his own datapad. He quickly prepared a map that graphically represented the route the pair would take to reach their targets. Pierce refused to be impressed at the officer's blatant skill. He should stay here and run the damn equipment while Pierce participated in the fighting, rather.

Pierce just reassured the Sith, though, "Hit enough and snag the transponders. I'll figure out where they're going. Should zero in on General Frelka."

"Very well, Lieutenant. Maintain your commlink for my contact." The Sith raised her chin briefly towards the captain and the two began walking out of the post.

Pierce watched them go, his gaze glued to the swaying hips just above the Sith's sweet heart-shaped ass. Not even Hurdenn's ridiculuous complaints about "coddling Sith who thought overmuch of themselves" ruined Pierce's stimulation and excitement as he regarded the mission. That was a woman who created wars, a woman men fought wars to win.

Pierce wanted to be a part of it.

* * *

 

"I don't like him," Quinn grumbled to Lusiel as they emerged from the post into the dense humid air of Taris. Both of them coughed briefly over the smell emanating from nearby noxious pools. But Lusiel shrugged.

"He seems competent enough." Lusiel said.

"Of brute force, possibly. There's little else I imagine he might accomplish," Quinn sneered.

"Well, brute force does have its uses on occasion. We'll just have to ensure we use this one appropriately." Lusiel was barely concerned. Pierce had struck her as an efficient soldier. She never truly disparaged soldiers, something Quinn normally admired about her innate character. Unusual for a Sith, she even worked to ensure they remained up and alive to fight again. She had told him once, “It’s the soldier who provides a backbone to the Empire's strength and power.” Lusiel didn’t respect the waste of good soldiers.

Now Quinn bit his lip against anymore illogical criticism of Lieutenant Pierce, refusing to admit he was still irritated. Lusiel shook her head at him in confusion, moving towards the speeders they'd use to transport to the staging area nearby the Republic routes. Vette was balanced on one speeder, chirping some sort of song that mimicked the sounds coming from the nearby forest. Quinn watched them, the way Lusiel bent to address her twi’lek slave with instructions for the time she and Quinn would be away from the base camp. At least Vette never disregarded Lusiel’s commands.

Quinn snorted. The next time he noticed Pierce shifting his legs to better adjust his erection against the side of his leg while oggling Lusiel’s chest, he'd just shoot the bastard's balls off. Problem solved.


	56. Whimpering like Sheep

It was blistering hot the further down into the mine Lusiel and Quinn moved. Which, considering how humid Taris was so normally, was fairly significant. Lusiel could feel trickles of sweat running down her spine as she leaned over the side of the elevator to look towards the ground below.

"My lord, please step away from the edge," Quinn implored. Lusiel looked over at him, her brow raised. He was standing stiffly straight right in the center of the elevator, as far from any edge of the thing as he could possibly achieve and still be moving downwards. It was obvious he wanted _off_ the thing as quickly as he could manage.

"I still find it hard to believe you're bothered riding on an elevator. You pilot a starship on a routine basis, after all." Lusiel shook her head towards him.

Quinn looked away, pretending nonchalance. "I once saw a fellow crushed underneath one. It took only half his body, so he managed to live through the accident. He was screaming in agony when I arrived to provide medical care. The best I could do was mercifully hasten his demise."  Lusiel nodded, stepping back from the edge of the elevator to stand next to Quinn. He sighed gratefully, only brushing her shoulder with his own softly. She remained quiet until the platform reached the ground and they both scrambled off of it. Then she remarked, smiling at him, "Well, the elevator gremlins were foiled once again, Quinn." 

Quinn actually laughed. Lusiel was sorry she didn’t manage to record the event, actually.

Down here, the mine was illuminated by some sort of orange-tinted lighting, casting everything into the strangest shadows. It was eerie. Lusiel finally opted to keep her lightsaber loose and activated nearby her side, after fooling herself with illusory motion off in the shadows. She refused to swipe at ghosts, at least. She would far rather catch them, first.  Ghosts might be _useful_.

"What exactly does it appear they're mining, do you think?" Lusiel peered briefly into one of the crates they were passing. Quinn passed his scanner over the material inside the crate and frowned down at the resulting data.

"It seems to be ordinary rock and dust, my lord. I can't determine what to make of it, actually. The effort seems futile. If they’re hoping for some sort of discernible value from this material, that is."

Lusiel shook her head, bewildered. "I doubt the Republic's War Trust generals would be interested in simple rocks." They finally came to a doorway leading into a rather extensive cavern. The miners had apparently gathered together, there. They huddled in a sorry lump of men towards the rear of the place, looking to Lusiel like nothing more pathetic than a herd of sheep. Some of them were even clinging together. Only the slimmest number of soldiers stood in a defensive line, there in front of the workers.

"Give off, you Imperial bastards! Come any closer and you're dead!" The military man in a standard lieutenant's Republic uniform shouting over at them didn't even tremble as he threatened her. Lusiel chuckled.

"Quinn, I think he actually believes he can accomplish it," Lusiel muttered.

"I do believe you're right, my lord."

Lusiel extended her lightsaber, casting new shadows across the floor in front of her. The crimson glare of her blade made the space around her look awashed in blazes of fire and smoke, as if a mere shift of her arm had set the very air all around her aflame. The miners wailed and the soldiers gasped, exclaimed, "It's a Sith!" But their commander was still defiant, rashly brave. Lusiel might have been impressed, except she was feeling so muggy in the heat of the cavern. He shouted at them angrily, "Don't think you can intimidate us!"

Lusiel smirked towards him, “Very well. I won’t bother, then.” Then she made her first force leap into the line of soldiers. The screams of the men echoed above them and all around them, both, mostly from the miners who watched the Sith move cleanly down the line. Like a cutting machine, mowing through a field of grass. The soldiers fell to either side of her, one by one, in nearly mechanical precision. Quinn trotted forward then, touching Lusiel's shoulder briefly as he scanned her for injuries.

The mine's foreman was grunting at them. He tried to keep from shaking, tried to keep his chin held up. Especially with the men behind him whimpering, some of them sniffling. "Hey … look! We're just miners. _Contracted_ miners, at that. We got no particular loyalty to anyone, either Republic or Empire. There's just plain no need to hurt any of us!"

Lusiel interrupted him, waving her hand through the air. "Where is General Frelka?"

"Frelka? Seriously? Erhm … he's the overseer but he ain't exactly hands-on. Hasn't been here in weeks! You gonna kill him, too?" He babbled at her.

She raised her eyebrow, vaguely curious, "Why? Do you have some issue with the general?"

"No, no! Not looking for any trouble, here. Republic don't pay me enough to get in your way, believe me. It’s just, if I hit the silent alarm – well, then Frelka'll come with his personal guard. If that's what you really want, I'll do it." The foreman held up both hands, bargaining for his life and for the lives of the men he worked with. Lusiel frowned, caught by the image.  "Just don't kill us!"

He looked very suddenly like one of the pitiable servants her aunt Pella employed in her household. They were always just that desperate, half begging every other day for just another sad hour of life. Eventually they just gave up and begged her to destroy them outright.  Lusiel waved at the foreman, unsmiling, " _That's_ what I want."

"Fine," the man nodded backwards over his shoulder towards one of the sheep trembling behind him. "Hit the alarm." Lusiel stood watching as one of the scared creatures scrambled to a panel and keyed in a sequence of numbers. She looked back at the foreman only after he begged again to know if she was going to kill them. Lusiel sighed. "How long will this take?"

"Could be a while. He's pretty far away and transportation on Taris can be tricky. Why? Does that mean you'll kill us?" Some of the miners cried out pitifully, grasped each other around the shoulders as they sank down onto their knees right there on the floor.

Lusiel rolled her eyes, “Just shut up." She moved off and away from the men, stepping over the dead soldiers. Quinn followed her, although he kept a closer eye on the miners than she did. Desperate men could act stupidly in certain circumstances. But the miners remained quiet in their bunched circle, quavering back against the wall as far from Lusiel as they could manage. Quinn finally leaned back against one of the mining machines to relax, watching them only intermittently.

Lusiel settled in place next to him, meditating quietly with her eyes closed. Quinn enjoyed that habit of hers, the way she could sink into quietest contemplation in simple moments like this one. It allowed him the opportunity to consider her, actually. Definitely one of his favorite pastimes since meeting her.

"I love the way your gaze feels against my skin, Malavai." Lusiel spoke quietly all of a sudden.

"I’ll make a note of it, my lord," he replied huskily. Lusiel chuckled. She rather doubted he was joking, too. He would likely include it in the written report he put together on his datapad when they finally settled down to sleep tonight.

The foreman was proved correct by the end. Frelka apparently dragged his sorry feet to the mine in order to save the men. By the time he finally appeared, even the miners were more angry at _him_ than afraid of Lusiel. Of course, she’d remained quiet and still while they waited, so perhaps the workers had forgotten the threat she posed them. But they glanced at her nervously when the general finally appeared, too. So maybe not.

Frelka was far more arrogant, even than the minor officer Lusiel cut down when she approached the cavern of the mine. That man proved to have gall enough to face her, at least. Frelka simply thought himself superior. His arrogance was like an oily sludge, like something nasty you got on your boots that only needed wiping off, Lusiel imagined. Not that he was ugly or smelly, either. He presented a compact figure, anyway. His hair was just starting to gray around a strong, firm jawline. His men were more professional; they at least didn’t swagger as they followed along behind the general.

Then General Frelka began speaking and Lusiel fought with every bone in her body to keep from laughing straight to his face. Frelka's voice had a nasal quality to it, making it sound far more delicate and lilting than any man of his figure and stature should use. Lusiel suddenly recalled character depictions in various comedic entertainments she’d enjoyed over the years, and every one of them had Frelka’s face in her mind’s eye right then.

"Sith, your incursion here violates the spirit of the Treaty of Coruscant. We have you dead to rights. Surrender!" Frelka tried sounding firm and significant. Lusiel silently applauded his effort. Golf clap, she thought.

"Do I _look_ like I have any respect for the Treaty of Coruscant?" Lusiel cocked her head to the side and adopted a telling pose. Like she was styling for a holocamera visual, with her lighsaber held straight out from her side in vivid red threat. The soldiers behind Frelka goggled as they watched her strut closer to them. She chuckled, “My father was at Coruscant, you know. With Malgus. They made it _burn_.”

General Frelka snarled at her, "You bitch. You’re too late, though! We’ve already managed it. This technology will give the Republic advantage enough, that it will be _your_ capital burning next! Kill me here, it doesn’t matter. I’m ready to give my life for this station.” The absurd miners in their huddled-up ball of trembling sheep burbled a brief cheer. But Lusiel only frowned at him in confusion.

Lusiel shrugged, "Do you mean these absurd piles of rocks you’re gathering? Really?"

"You mean you don't even know? Well, this is too rich!" Frelka’s eyes glinted suddenly and his hand shot up, his blaster trilling as a bolt flew out at her fast, brilliant. Lusiel stumbled when the bolt impacted the hard armored plate that covered her shoulder, felt hot pain against her skin and the slow trickle of blood on her skin. Behind her, she could hear Quinn shouting angry curse words, very uncharacteristic of him. But Frelka was screaming shrilly, annoyingly, "Kill her, kill her! We can’t let her warn them!"

But Lusiel was already leaping, the force of her jump carrying her in a straight deadly onward momentum. Her lightsaber met him dead center, sliding through skin and muscle until it extended back and out of his spine. Frelka’s eyes widened as he stared down at her, shocked, dying. Lusiel hissed, “Shut. Up. And die.” The man screamed one more time, piteously, past the blood spilling from his lips. He tried grappling the blade impaling him, felt his fingers burning, the skin smoking as he held the long length of lightsaber.

“Help …” Frelka gurgled, dimly heard the sounds of his men falling, falling, Quinn’s blaster pinging with every shot. The miners were screaming, panicked sounds, then their boots pounded the dust-strewn floor as they chased each other past the doors. Running to escape. Quinn yelled out another loud curse, coldly executed a soldier kneeling in front of him with a single shot to the skull. But Frelka only hung there, crying, “Please. Help me. It … hurts.”

“Give me the codes. To the computer, here.”

“Anything. Anything! My … side pocket, datapad! Now help me!”

“Very well. I’ll _help_.” Lusiel jerked her lightsaber sideways, almost ripping the man in complete half as the blade sliced through his torso like it was melting butter. And Frelka finally collapsed down onto the floor in a bloody heap. Mercifully quiet.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Brief interjection, here. I played SWTOR extensively during the Beta, from October all the way through to the game's release. At the time, there was a regular glitch that had companions refrain from climbing onto the elevator with your character. They'd perch there on the end of the platform and just watch your character go all the way down. The glitch continued for a while after the game's release, although sometimes players would report that their companion who did get on the elevator just randomly keeled over dead.
> 
> I reported the issue several times in Beta, always describing it by saying, "I think my companion is scared to get on the elevator." When people told me their companions were dying on the elevators I laughed and said that the developers were surely messing with players who'd joked about their companions being afraid of the things.
> 
> So here I opted to include a brief mention of the "elevator boss" that seems to get every one of us playing the game at least once or twice, lol.


	57. Just a hole in my shoulder

Pierce clenched his fist when Moff Hurdenn barked at him over the commlink. He sounded like a yipping lapdog there on the holoimage. Pierce wanted to slam the bastard Moff’s stupid face with his own thick fist. But Hurdenn only continued yammering, "You will do as you're told, Lieutenant! Nor do I appreciate your persistent argument, otherwise. Stand down as _my_ men engage the enemy!" The man's image twinked out abruptly fast, and Pierce growled tellingly at the empty commlink.

"Whatcha think, Pierce? Yer Sith gonna be pleased?" The rough soldier next to him snarled as they each crouched down in cover behind one of Taris' ruins. The things loomed high into the air all around them, like fingers that stretched into the sky trying to grab it, to drag it down onto the ground just like everything else.

"Hardly." Pierce grumbled an answer back at him, as bursts of blaster shots and men shouting in obvious battle began to sound from nearby but out of sight. "She was pretty adamant she was lookin' to find General Durant. Killing off his men won't help that along."

“Fucking Moff thinks he knows better than a Sith, heh. He’s trying to prove something, most like.” The roughnik bent his sweat-ridden head down just far enough to spit a glob roughly against the floor of the thick forest around them.

Pierce tapped his commlink again, fairly certain Lord Lusiel would want to know what was happening. Mostly to keep her from frying his own ass when she heard the news, and focused any temper tantrum she was inclined to vent onto the most proper target. He didn’t even feel sorry for stupid Hurdenn, either. Fucking ass of a Moff …

The men Pierce had gathered into his very own black ops unit settled in around him, several keeping an eye on the fighting and all of them pretending they weren't listening in for the Sith's response. Several of them hummed admiringly when Lord Lusiel came into view, "Ah … yea." Pierce blinked at her for a long moment himself, actually.

The woman was sitting against a shattered wall, focused on her commlink. Her robe and armor had been pulled back and away from her shoulder, leaving an expanse of her own skin bare and naked. Pierce could make out a blackened hole against the alabaster skin, an obviously well-placed blaster shot if Pierce was any judge. Only the briefest bits of blood still oozed from the hole, though. Mainly thanks to the Imperial captain crouched next to her, working deftly to ease the damage.

Damn, Pierce thought. Technnical expert and a medic, to boot. Multi-talented little bastard. No wonder the Sith kept him around. Likely saw way more than her pretty shoulder, too. Since she seemed content to use him routinely for doctoring, anyway. Lucky son of a bitch.

"Lieutenant, General Frelka is dead and I have managed to locate General Minst. I'll be moving to intercept him momentarily," Lusiel informed him. A small medical droid began dancing next to her shoulder, making little clicking sounds as it sprayed kolto across the wound. The captain said something then that Pierce couldn't make out. She glanced sideways, "Yes, Quinn, of course. I did say 'momentarily' anyway. I'll eat first."

It looked like an old argument to Pierce, as the Sith was softly rolling her eyes. "Sounds good, m'lord. From me, too. Scout report … That battalion belonging to General Durant is on the move. Odds are he's fortifying his position. And some of the men from my black ops unit are back.” One of Pierce’s men grunted, shifted in his crouched-down position. Pierce ignored him, leaned a bit closer to the link, “We could have discreetly followed the battalion to find the general."

Lusiel frowned, "Why do I sense a 'but' in your statement, lieutenant?"

Pierce rolled his burly shoulder, so that the armored plate against his back clicked slowly in a cadenced motion. "Moff Hurdenn sent a platoon instead. He grounded me and my own men. His forces are engaging General Durant's as we speak. By the time he's done, they'll be destroyed and we won't have discovered where the general is located."

Her lips pursed. Pierce noticed the dark of her eyes, the way they turned from soft chocolate brown to near black. He made a mental note, that black eyes on this particular Sith spelled pure danger and threat. Lord Lusiel murmured, then. Like a cat flexing its claws on the floor. "Summon Hurdenn into this conversation. I will address him."

"M'lord." Pierce responded. He dutifully patched in to Moff Hurdenn's commlink channel but remained in link, as well. She certainly didn't tell him to go away. And Pierce wanted to hear what the Sith had to say … Maybe she really would tear his head off his shoulders, so to speak.

Moff Hurdenn's image came into view, practically gloating like an impish fiend from the dregs of the Void most like. He chattered at them in a sing-song voice, even, "Ah, there you are, my lord. I see Lieutenant Pierce has already hailed you. I was hoping to do it myself. I assume the lieutenant has updated you, then.” The Moff started preening, “Thanks to me, General Durant's battalion will not be joining him. We have quite handily decimated them.”

Lord Lusiel's jaw tightened. She spoke firmly. "You are an idiot, Hurdenn. Be grateful I have been directed to remain still long enough for this absurd hole in my skin to be repaired, or I would put my fist through your over-large skull.” She hissed as the captain spread a salve along the edges of her wound, but quieted when the officer leaned closer to blow a quick puff of air across the broken skin. To stimulate the cooling agent in the salve. Then she drew in a breath, exhaled and opened her eyes, “Let me be clear, Moff. Any future actions in regards the War Trust generals will be determined by me alone. Now remove your men from the area, all of them. Lieutenant Pierce and his men will scour for General Durant’s headquarters. Do you understand me, Hurdenn?"

Hurdenn looked about as green as the foliage that surrounded him, actually. Like he was about to lean over into a puking mess of a Moff right then and there. He gulped solidly, "Yes, well. Of course. I'll make it so immediately. My lord, of course. My lord."

Pierce heard several coughs and not a few hiccups, as the men around him bit their own lips practically blood-raw to keep from laughing. The Moff blanched even further as he realized all the men had witnessed the full glorious rebuke. Pierce rubbed the corner of his mouth with a thick swipe of his tongue, refusing to crack even a small smile. He only assured Lord Lusiel quick like, promised her, "We'll get something on Durant, swear it. Good luck with the General Minst fellow."

She nodded, and Pierce watched as her image disappeared. One of the men looked over at him. "That was the littlest and just about prettiest Sith I've ever seen. But she damn sure seems to know how to deal with a Moff, doesn't she?"

Pierce grunted, "Oh yea. She’s a fine one."


	58. Alarms Blaring

Red lights were flashing all along the walls of the corridors Lusiel and Quinn raced through, alarms blaring loudly at them from overhead. "Hurry, Quinn, dammit!" Lusiel pressed them both, pulling Quinn, compelling them both along using the Force so that they moved faster. But Quinn could not possibly maintain such a speed. He stumbled just as they reached the vault, hitting the security panel harshly. He only barely prevented serious injury to himself by tucking into the fall and throwing his own shoulder into the panel, rather than his head.

Lusiel cursed as she watched him fall, heard the crack of his body against the hard metal of the panel. He might have broken something, some bone or rib or … She snarled through clenched teeth, "Minst is a dead man. I will _slaughter_ him. Now get us into the vault quickly, Quinn."

"Yes, my lord!" Quinn yanked himself up, panting roughly as his fingers raced across the surface of the security panel. Lusiel hummed approvingly as the computer began to intone loudly, "Vault code sequence arming … Vault code sequence initiated …" She rocked back onto her heels, scanning the corridor behind them. The sixty second warning sounded just as Lusiel observed several Republic troopers moving out from a nearby doorway, their weapons raised up as they eyed the doors to the secured room and its precious blast doors. Only Lusiel and Quinn blocked their way.

"The imposter's estimate better be right," Quinn was saying, referring to the pitiful Rodian who'd died holding the secured vault's codes in his little green hands. The skinny green rodent of a soldier had even bragged grossly, how he pretended to be Minst to keep them from learning of the detonation in time. Killing him was too damned easy. She wanted to rip Minst apart with her bare hands! Quinn spoke as quickly as his fingers were moving, "We have less than a minute."

"I'm quite certain you can get us in there, captain. Stay focused." Lusiel activated her lightsaber even as she told him, "This will take only a moment."

"Of course, my lord."

Lusiel's Force-strong jump crushed the neck of the first trooper. Whatever scream he might have loosed was lost in the wicked cracking sound of bone and blood from his dying. Her lightsaber lashed out, slicing across the neck of the second soldier just under the rim of his helmet into the tender flesh between that and his breastplate. He gurgled a heavy cry, falling even as Lusiel spun around behind him, avoiding the blaster bolt the last trooper managed to get off. At least the bolt finished the poor dying sod she’d just sliced, Lusiel thought. Mercifully quick.

But the man who’d fired the bolt yelped in dismay as he watched his friend fall down, dead. Lusiel flung her lightsaber at him, watching it penetrate his chest in a single solid motion, heard the thunking blow in the center of his chest. The man yelled out, shocked and afraid as he started falling. Then Lusiel yanked back at the lightsaber, Force-pulling it back into her hand. She didn’t even watch the solider hit the ground as she sped back towards Quinn again.

Lusiel eyed the flashing red light above the vault door, just as the computer-generated self-destruct recited, "Ten seconds to self-destruct." Lusiel glanced at Quinn, quipped. "Well, if there's anything we needed to say before the end, now would be the time, I suppose."

Quinn didn't look up from his effort at the panel. He only stated distinctly, "I love you, Lusiel."

The door to the vault slammed open with a mighty bang. Lusiel jumped, grabbing Quinn's arm in a hard grip even as they sailed through the entrance into the vault. She heard another damn Rodian voice screaming, "Shut the door! Hurry!" Lusiel glanced behind her from where she knelt on the floor, saw the explosion starting at the end of the corridor, the fire leaping across the tunnel and racing towards the vault. Then the door clanged shut again.

"Stupid! You stupid, stupid Sith! You could have killed us all with that reckless stunt!" General Minst was almost jumping up and down in bitterly agitated anger, waving a green hand at them while his antennae twitched atop his head. He looked like a great big bug, Lusiel thought. Bugs deserved to be squashed.

A staid looking human officer next to Minst leaned wearily back against the table near the rear of the bunker, nearly dropping the datapad controller he must have scrambled to use to close the door to the vault again. He clutched his chest, as if his heart was racing madly enough to pound its way right through all the bone and muscle there.

Lusiel thundered to her feet, not even looking at Quinn as he pulled himself back up. She glared at the Republic general, hissed at him, "I am going to enjoy killing you."

"Hah! You'll get nothing by killing me. The reactor explosion destroyed all evidence of Project Siantide. You need me to duplicate it." Minst laughed and rumbled. If he really was a bug, he’d be one of those grass-hopping insects that enjoyed rubbing their wings together to make annoying sounds.

Lusiel slowly started stalking towards the general, "You delude yourself thinking I came here to try."

"What, you don't want access to a project capable of creating new and boundless energy? Ironic, isn't it, that the Empire's original bombardment of this planet is what made Siantide possible, considering it's the remains of Taris' original inhabitants we're mining." Minst paced back and forth. "You'd be a fool not to want such power."

Lusiel shook her head at the Rodian, her dark eyes glittering bitterly at him. She really did look like a Nexu beast right then. Hungry and raging. She purred at him, "At this moment, the only thing I want is your scaly green _head_. You might have killed him, _I_ nearly had to kill him getting him in here! Let me show you how to break someone in half!"

"What? No!" General Minst tried jumping behind his assistant, but the man pushed him away disgustedly. The two men scuffled back and forth for several moments. Long enough. Quinn blithely raised his blaster up; he shot the general’s assistant flatly in the center of his face. Quinn stared impassively as the man’s head just disappeared.

But Lusiel only continued to stalk the general, listening to him gibber as she prodded him with her lightsaber. She chased him around the table twice before she finally tired of the game. She jumped into the center of the large, rectangular table. She lifted the Rodian into the air, watched him squirm and jerk in her hold. Then she proceeded to shake and batter him back and forth, right there in the middle of the air so he couldn’t see or even know what was killing him. The cracking of his tenderest bones and limbs rang through the small room for several long moments, interspersed with Rodian warbling and pain-filled sobbing. By the time Lusiel flung the general onto the floor he was a mess of shattered flesh and bones, and very, very dead.

"Little bastard!" Lusiel sneered at the corpse, jumping down. She considered kicking the thing but it wouldn't really help. She felt agitated, angry, offended at her very core over the thought how close to dying they’d both been. She literally quivered as she stood there. Lusiel spun around to face Quinn, prepared to say something sure that would likely be stupid and absurd, some kind of wavering joke maybe. But then she caught sight of his gaze, the way his eyes were blue-black in his face as he watched her, and she stopped.

Quinn’s eyes boiled blue, shined with the same turmoil burning in her. Like flames, like fire. His hands were clenched into tight fists as he ran his gaze heatedly down the length of Lusiel’s body. She watched a bead of sweat run down the side of his jaw, fall over onto his shoulder to dampen the fabric of his collar. He shifted, so that the cords of his neck tautened, stretched. She admired the turn of his head, the way his body stiffened and tensed, wanted suddenly to taste him.

"Were you serious?" Lusiel asked him suddenly, quietly. But the question still echoed in the vaulted bunker. She could just make out the sound of the fire blazing on the other side of the door, thought wildly how it complimented the growing inferno she was feeling.

Quinn's eyes shot back up to her face, and he growled at her, "I'm rarely anything but serious." He stepped forward, gripped her under her arms to lift her up and onto the large table behind her. Lusiel inhaled, hard. She watched Quinn's face, lifted her arms out of the way as he worked rapidly to unfasten the buckles holding her breastplate in place. He pulled and yanked at her clothes and armor, moving fast. Almost as fast as he had against the panel outside the door. As if he needed to get to her skin as desperately as he’d needed to reach inside the room, like his life depended on it.

He reached up, held her head between his hands and lowered his mouth to seize hers. He claimed her mouth! His tongue shot between her lips and swept the interior of her mouth, tasted her wildly. Lusiel moaned into him, arching up against his still-clothed chest, rubbed her naked breasts against him and thrilled to the rough sensation on her nipples. He pulled from her mouth, ran his lips across her jaw, nipping at her tender skin. He whispered into her ear, "I'm going to mark you."

Lusiel leaned her head aside, moaned, "Yes." How did he know how much she’d wanted such a thing? Lusiel keened as Quinn's lips drifted down to her neck, where he started nibbling and biting her tenderly. He suckled intermittently, pulled roughly until a strong, vivid bruise showed against her flesh there. She heard him grunt in satisfaction, before he continued sliding his mouth down, leaving small bruises in a vivid track to her breast. He gripped her nipple between his teeth, held it softly there, flicking it with his tongue. Lusiel sobbed, her head thrown back as she begged, begged, "Please."

He continued drawing on her breast but she felt him reaching down between them, heard the rasp of the fingers against his pants' fastenings. "Yes," she moaned, threw her legs wide apart so his naked groin could set against her own finally. He entered her fast and hard, groaned as he felt himself slide inside of her as deep as he could go. He leaned back, looking down at her breast and smiled when he saw a vivid, dark bruise against the pale pink of her areola.

Lusiel grabbed at his coat, held onto it strongly as he started thrusting into her. She wrapped her legs around his waist, gripped him strongly as she raised her hips rhythmically to meet his hard thrusts. The table underneath them creaked in time to their movements. It was wild, fierce and turbulent – it was nearly violent, intense, and it was so fast. He held her hips in place as he felt her tightening around him, her inner muscles gripping against his cock, felt the satisfaction rising along the length of his spine. It burst upon them both, and Lusiel buried her face against his chest, cried his name, cried. Quinn shook against her, his head leaning forward as he pressed his lips against the top of her head. He panted kisses all along her temple, rested his sweaty forehead along the tendrils of her hair that had escaped its ties, and he softly said her name.

Lusiel panted, breathed. She whimpered, "Say it again."

"I love you."

She rested against him, quiet, listening as the fire burned outside and against the door. She exhulted in the sound of his heart beating under her cheek, smiled slowly. That she still had him. She said softly, told him, "I'm glad."


	59. The Blue Twit

"What the heck are you doing this time, Jaesa?" Vette found the Sith apprentice kneeling next to one of the venomous pools that surrounded the Imperial garrison. The green goo that composed the toxic lake nearly glowed with lethal promise. Vette shuddered just imagining Jaesa tumbling into the mess. Taris was so not her favorite planet. "If you fall in, I am _not_ pulling your ass back out, you know."

Jaesa only laughed. She pulled what looked like a vial from the folds of her robe, "I'm going to retrieve a sample. Look at it … it’s got to be poisonous! I’m just not sure what the effects would be, so I want to test it!"

"Test it? How?" Possibilities swarmed Vette's imagination. There wasn’t a single one that seemed vaguely pleasant, even. Quite a few involved the damage to her own sensitive system, in fact. Vette eyed the green, stinking pools that stretched to some distant shore – that stuff would surely turn her blue skin into a bubbling mess that fell right off her bones!

"I was thinking one of the random soldiers inside there would make a good test subject."

Vette’s eyes flew wide open, horrified, "You'd make one of them drink that stuff?"

"Oh, I was just going to drop a small sample into a random beverage, actually. Did you know there's a cantina downstairs?" Jaesa smirked at the Twi'lek.

"You can't do that!" Vette shook her head. And of course she was on her own to deal with this crap. Every single time Lusiel and Quinn made themselves scarce, she had to scamper around watching over Jaesa’s utter insanity. Why _me_ , she wondered.

"Why not? I'm curious."

"What you are is just … wrong. Off." Vette shook her head, mumbled under breath, "Crazy-ass."

"I am not!" Jaesa's eyes flashed red. But Vette only shrugged.

"Hey, if the shoe fits. You do realize the craziest people are the ones who insist it's just not possible, right?"

Jaesa stomped her foot. "How dare you!"

Vette wagged a small blue finger at her. "You know Lord Lusiel wouldn't approve of you dropping poisons into random people's drinks. Because it's insane! And she despises insanity!"

"Hah, like _you_ understand a Sith well enough to judge someone like Lord Lusiel!"

"Doesn't take any incredible deductive reasoning. I leave that bullshit to Quinn. But if every crazy person Lord Lusiel comes into contact with ends up dead or broken, I'm going to assume she really doesn't like crazy."

Jaesa stopped, glaring at the twi’lek. She flounced, crossing her arms over her chest like a toddler throwing a tantrum and pretending otherwise.

Vette glared right back at her, "Your problem, Jaesa, is you don't have any _direction_. You're just floundering around trying to behave like you imagine every Sith really is … like they’re nothing but monsters, crazy lunatic killers. That’s what those Jedi buddies of yours said they were, right?" Vette rolled her eyes.

"Lord Lusiel _is_ a killer!"

"But she has purpose! She’s focused, direct and neat! Ruthless and dark, yea. But she doesn’t do anything without a reason, some design! That's what makes her better than you!"

Jaesa cocked her head, regarded Vette. "You admire her."

Vette snorted, "Oh, no. Don't even try to shift this around onto me. I'm not looking to poke into any pools of green shit around here, anyway.” Vette stomped her foot, “Nope, you better work on pulling your head out of your own damn ass, Jaesa. In other words ... Grow up!  You're embarrassing all of us." Vette spun around on the heel of her slender foot, squelching her way through the weeds that somehow managed to grow nearby the noxious green pool of waste and mess. Her lekku bounced agitadedly as she left Jaesa standing there.

Jaesa slumped onto a nearby crate, glaring out over the toxic sludge and tapped the vial against her knee. She sighed, before tossing the rounded container into the green mess. Then she muttered sullenly, “I really do hate that blue twit.” Because Vette was no twit at all, of course.


	60. Our bodies will slow the charge

Pierce hissed sharply at the stinging sensation of a blaster bolt slicing against his hip. He returned the fire, watched with gruff satisfaction as another Republic trooper caught his bolt squarely in the center of his chest and fell hard to the ground.

_"We're taking fire, outnumbered. Should be able to hold them off long enough for you to break through but that's it," he'd told her. “I will_ not _accept failure, Lieutenant," she'd responded._

As he looked down the barrel of his blaster into the eyes of yet another Republic flunkie determined to die, Pierce still thought that the Sith was worth it. He had never known such a compelling creature. If it took him killing another thousand of these fools, so be it. Strength like that, power like that – hell, that's worth dying for, he believed. That's why he'd sworn it.

_"We'll do what we can. Knock out those defense systems. We'll hold the position for you. Or, worst case, our bodies will slow down their charge. Proud to have served, my lord."_

The damn Republic general called Durant was dug into a fortified camp just up ahead. It was the very last of Durant's battalion that fought Pierce and his men, now. Most of the bodies litering the ground all around Pierce, in fact, wore Republic uniforms. He'd pressed them hard, indeed. But more and more of his own men were falling atop the dead Republic soldiers, now. The Imperials were being worn down, whittled away. There was only so much that even the best soldiers could withstand. Very soon, none of them would be left standing.

_" They flushed us out. We're on the move. Lost a third of my men but we're still hitting them ten-to-one. Still too many. I'll try to rally the men. Hold the enemy off as long as I can. Pierce out."_

Pierce could feel blood trickling down his leg. One of his men grunted and collapsed to the ground at his feet, swearing harshly, "Finish the damn bastards, finish 'em!" Pierce heard a cheer go up through what was left of the Imperial line, as his soldiers shouted a rallying cry when they heard the man's dying words. They fought harder than they'd ever fought, blaster rifles blazing and blades flashing in the dying light of the afternoon. The rewarding cries of dying republic soldiers filled the air.

But the push-back was short-lived.

_"My lord, the enemy is regrouping. I'm down to three men, against about three hundred. Hoped we could take out a whole battalion. Looks like we'll come up short, though. When you see him, tell … Durant …"_

Pierce caught his last men as he went down, the both of them falling to their knees, bleeding. He watched the dying light in his man's eyes, looked around groggily. They were all gone, he was the last. He breathed out, weary, tired. He glanced over, saw some Republic soldiers moving among the bodies, picking at the remains and moving them to the side of the field. He groaned under his breath, reached for a blaster. He’d blow them straight into the Abyss, take them with him …

Then he heard the lightsaber singing, the melody filling the air in a crescendo, creating a vivid masterpierce of screams and dying. And Pierce smiled grimly.

She was here.


	61. Battleplans

"Pay attention to the captain, Lieutenant. His tactical skills are unmatched," Lusiel waved a hand towards Quinn, and never mind the way Pierce clenched his jaw. She was defiant, rather; still aggressive over her master’s subtle threats towards Quinn. Pierce was only barely noted by Darth Baras right then, and Lusiel preferred it that way. Lusiel glanced at Quinn, with the barest lift of her chin.

Of course Quinn understood.

He didn’t even look towards the holoterminal where the image of Darth Baras loomed over them all. Rather, Quinn stepped towards the war table, with its vivid display of maps and reports. He knew Baras wouldn't tolerate failure. With the entirety of Moff Hurdenn’s army under Lusiel’s direct command, even the smallest blunder could be used to justify the most dire consequences for _his_ Sith. Lusiel had to achieve complete and utter victory – had to! So she trusted no one else but Quinn to design her strategy, and then she declared it openly. Ardent and fierce before her master, as usual.

Nuances. Muddied waters of Sith politics. Constantly moving, constantly shifting.

" _I can do this, I won't let you down,_ " Quinn's look assured her.  
" _I know_ ," Lusiel nodded.

Quinn had pored over the maps describing the defenses and fortifications Admiral Faraire set in place around his Republic base and its port, circled the war table for long, long hours. Now he smoothly delivered the analysis, his voice certain, heady in its surety, "Admiral Faraire maintains a numerical advantage in the upcoming battle. But there are ways of circumventing it, of inflicting casualties in precise coordination that prevents him from maneuvering appropriately to defend himself.” Quinn pointed at the map displayed on the war table, “Three separate units, each one striking precisely as we direct. The first will move on the base’s power station. At the same time, we will sabotage the spaceport force field to thwart any possible reinforcements. The last one of our units will focus directly on Faraire’s conscripted forces, until they break and flee the field."

Above them, Baras snuffled past his masked cover. He sounded bored, as if he was absolutely certain Lusiel would succeed. He waved his hand, "With Quinn coordinating from the rear and Lord Lusiel leading the front line offensive, our victory is certain. I am satisfied. Contact me once you’ve planted your boot over Faraire’s fat neck, Lord Lusiel. Baras out." Lusiel ignored the wink of his holoimage disappearing, only turned to her people once he was completely vanished. They required her direction, her guidance. Where best to utilize their skills, she considered.

Pierce was adamant, of course. Just as fierce as he was when she discovered him kneeling down among the shattered pile of Republic and Imperial troops, splattered with blood and sighing in his own pain. Just as determined to fight before he dreamed of breaking. Now, he stepped forward and thumbed his chest, bold as ever. A total soldier in every stance, every motion. "I'm the best choice for front line work. You need a soldier," Pierce declared. He reminded Lusiel very suddenly of Dace Gredge – her father’s friend, who fought endlessly alongside Lucian Phyre and now guarded what Lucian's daughter valued more than anything.  Pierce was strong like that; Lusiel decided she'd keep him.

"I disagree," Quinn cocked his head to the side. "If the frontal assault isn't handled correctly, your route into the command center will be clogged with run-over battlefield soldiers. In my opinion, Jaesa should accompany you. She can use her power to see into the hearts of the enemy and identify the most insecure ranks." Pierce watched Lusiel turn to regard her apprentice appraisingly, obviously considering.

Pierce towered over the Sith Lord. Lusiel was so small; it was really hard to conceive so much fucking power could be contained in such a delightfully small creature, actually. Pierce was well able to look practically straight down over her head and frame, as he stood there in front of her. He regarded the way her armored chestplate was curved to shape around her breasts, wondered if they were that plump and round really; stood there imagining how those pretty feminine mounds would look _without_ all the hard, cold armor covering them.

Then Lusiel leaned sideways only slightly, turning her head just enough Pierce saw the side of her face and jaw. He realized the pale skin along her jaw and throat was mottled with a line of small, purple bruises, reaching from just under her ear down to the soft curve where her neck met her shoulder. Pierce glanced towards Lusiel’s captain, saw Quinn making notes against the edges of the map on the war table as he patiently waited for Lusiel to decide. Pierce clenched his fists.

Lusiel didn’t notice Pierce’s preoccupation. She only considered the question of her apprentice’s readiness for field combat, rather. But Jaesa was too valuable an asset to waste on a mere sabotage effort, she decided. "You're right, captain. Jaesa, you'll accompany me." Jaesa raised her chin, palpably radiating an excited and nervous energy. Lusiel almost smiled at her. Jaesa was still so much the raw, young bird flexing its wings for the first time, happy at last to be freed from its cage. Damn the Jedi. They had stifled her, smothered her. Jaesa wanted to be loosened finally, wanted to be as free as she felt; she wanted to _fight_.

"Very good, my lord." Quinn said. He pointed at them, "That leaves Pierce and Vette to handle the power station demolition and spaceport sabotage. If the traps and mines aren't disabled in time, you'll be under constant turret fire inside the Republic base." He glanced at Pierce, saw the lieutenant glaring at him. He frowned, confused. Until he noted the curl of Lusiel’s head as she tapped her fingers against her thigh in brief thought. Quinn could see the bruises on her throat from where _he_ was standing, even; just beautiful, perfect little bruises.  He felt his groin turn hard.

Quinn looked away, caught Vette’s eye. The twi’lek was leaning back against one of the far consoles as they bantered over strategies and tactics. As if she was only barely interested, or even halfway concerned. Maybe she was bored. Except she grinned at Quinn suddenly, held her thumb up into the air. Quinn only shook his head at her.

Lusiel looked up at Pierce, "Lieutenant, tell me what you think. I know you wanted to be with me in the front. But since that's not possible, which position of these two is best suited to your talents?"

Pierce puffed his chest out, blatantly pleased she was looking to him for insight. She knew what he was capable of, knew he was a damn good soldier. And he didn't have to fuck her to gain her approval, either. "I know how the Republic systems work. I can sabotage their spaceport, my lord." Vette stepped up, "And I can dismantle the traps and mines at the power station with my eyes closed. But don't worry, my lord. I'll keep one open anyway."

"Very well. You are aware of what’s expected of each one of you, you will _not_ disappoint me. Not in anything. You’ll destroy our enemies, or die in the trying. I demand nothing less." Lusiel motioned, and Jaesa stepped closer to stand alongside her. The two women seemed such slight, delicate things standing there together. Pierce imagined they were a lot like those deadly plants that shot poisonous darts at you; pretty enough but lethally dangerous to the idiots dumb enough to get too close.

Pierce watched them, saw Lord Lusiel glance towards the captain only barely. Quinn nodded at her, "Good luck, my lord. I'll be coordinating the attacks via holo."

"Don't worry, captain. The real soldiers will handle things this time around," Pierce slapped his hands together, sneering. But Quinn ignored him as he turned back to the war table and his pretty fucking maps. Pierce marched towards the doors, following behind the women and able to watch their pretty rears swaying. It’s the only reason he saw Lusiel glancing back one last time, knew Quinn looked up right then.

" _I'll be back_."  
_"Be careful."_

It was the first time since Balmorra they'd fought apart from each other.

* * *

 

"What's got your panties in a twist, lieutenant?" Vette was excitedly bouncing along next to Pierce as they left Hurdenn's command post.

Pierce spoke without really thinking. He was still watching Lusiel up ahead, walking firmly off into the darkness of the early morning towards Faraire's compound. Jaesa was striding alongside her, while a contingent of soldiers fell into place around them.

"That damn captain won command of this operation because he's fucking her," Pierce scoffed.

Vette huffed, grabbed at Pierce's arm. He stopped abruptly, glared down at her. The Twi'lek, though, was looking around intently, trying to see if anyone had heard the man's idiotic comment. Then she frowned up at Pierce, pulled at him, directing him off and away from the gathering troops.

"You're an Imperial, right? Sheesh! Where’d you grow up, that you didn’t learn how stupid it can be to question a Sith’s say-so?” Vette scowled.

Pierce folded his arms across his broad chest, glowering at Vette. It wasn't the first nor even the most reckless thing he'd ever done. Wouldn't be the last, either, Pierce thought.

"Fine, forget I asked." Vette's long blue lekku quivered as she shook her head at him disgustedly. "Look, the first time I saw Lord Lusiel she was still a mere student, a lowly, little acolyte on Korriban. Hadn't even been given the title of apprentice, in fact. They tested her by giving her the responsibility of judging three separate prisoners, and I was there, watched her do it. I remember thinking she'd surely just kill them outright, cause that's what so many Sith would do. Certainly easy enough. One, two, three – all dead, so nothing to worry about, right?"

Pierce’s brow knitted with impatience. He refused to admit he was interested in what Vette was telling him. But he stayed there, staring dour fully at the little blue thing.

"The first was a hunter who took out a contract, only to discover it was an Imperial officer. She didn't even manage to kill him before she was caught. Just kept saying she didn't know he was an Imperial when she took the job." Vette looked up at Pierce, who nodded. "Lord Lusiel didn't kill her but she didn't let her go, either. Sent her off to Imperial Intelligence instead. Said, ‘Next time she might finish the task properly.’ Seems they like using assassins over there, big surprise, right?"

Vette inhaled. "The second was an aging Sith warrior who's mistake had cost the lives of hundreds of Imperials. He didn't even ask for mercy. Wanted just to hold a blade so he could die honorably in battle. Lord Lusiel refused, slaughtered him where he stood. _Then_ she told the jailor who mocked the man's corpse he should show more respect to a warrior who'd loyally served the Empire."

By now, Pierce was fascinated. He lowered his head in rapt silence as Vette finished the story.

"The last was some pitiful Bith who'd apparently been caught in the wrong place at the wrong time, framed for a theft he'd not actually committed and tortured several times by then. She didn't let him go, though it seemed obvious enough he was innocent. Nope. She sent him off for more questioning! Said it was important to figure out why he'd been framed and by whom."

Vette rocked back on her heels, remembering. "I was blown away. Couldn't really wrap my head around her for a while. I remember the jailor making some sideways comment about how 'that Sith is gonna rule before she's done'. Probably the first and only smart thing the jackass ever said. But I paid attention to her after that, believe me. So let me tell you now, lieutenant." Vette glanced around one more time, then she looked back up at Pierce again.

"I don’t doubt for even a minute how careful Lord Lusiel chooses the roles people play in her life. _Nothing_ she does is without careful reason. So I have no doubt she gives Quinn charge because he's damn well capable of being in charge. I trust him with my life because _she_ trusts him." Vette poked a small hard finger into Pierce's chest and he grunted, surprised. But Vette just shot him a gloating smirk. "So? You ready to kick some Republic ass? Or would you rather worry some more about who's cock Lord Lusiel's been riding?"

Pierce gaped at Vette's back as she flounced away. He muttered sourly, “Damn it to hells.” Then he followed her into the dark.


	62. An Invasion Finished

Quinn worked methodically to disable the security codes that barred the door in front of him. The sounds of battle continued to ring through the air, explosions sounding from over the far rise. The dark sky was actually tinged orange from the fiery blazes that marked Lusiel's passage through the very center of the Republic base. Every vibrant boom that he heard soothed Quinn’s anxious appreciation of the distance that divided him from her, every scared yell, every terrified shout – all of it helped him focus even more. Because then he knew she was still methodically fighting her way forward, knew she was still battling hard.

Several Imperial soldiers accompanying him shifted restlessly as he worked on the locks, their weapons held up guardedly as their gazes scanned the dark, gray shadows all around them carefully. The entire contingent watched, waited for any possible Republic troopers that might move to intercept them. Quinn appreciated their meticulous attention. All it would take to ruin them entirely, would be a single Republic fool running frenziedly from the nearby chaos of battle to catch them at it. Moff Hurdenn clucked at him with impatience, “Hurry, damn it.”

But Quinn ignored him. He only concentrated on the security panel in front of him, on getting through it. To reach her, and never mind the sounds of fighting he could discern through the door. His last communication with Lusiel was so brief, as she described reaching the doors leading into Faraire’s innermost headquarters. “ _We must concentrate on the fight ahead, Faraire will keep his most prized lieutenants close. I’ll cut them all down_.”

Now Vette abruptly dug one of her sharp, slender elbows solidly into the Moff’s side, hushing him quietly, and Hurdenn huffed a light gasp. Pierce smirked at him, saw him turn a sizzling glare over at Vette. As if he wanted more than anything to punish the little female. But he only clapped his mouth closed and kept right on sulking.

Lord Lusiel considered the twi'lek like she was a favored pet, and that secured Vette a unique position. A slave with power enough to knock around or blatantly insult a _Moff_ , and get away with it. And she was just plain bold enough to take advantage of the esteem, too. Pet or not – Vette strutted around the entire place like she owned the damned thing. Hurdenn could only glare at her, futile and useless sod of a man.  Pierce was disgusted.

The door began to swing open then. Quinn inhaled slowly as he looked down the long, narrow tunnel in front of them, knew it lead into the very heart of the Republic command post. He stepped inside, directed the soldiers following them to create a defensive line there in the immediate doorway. “Ensure that no Republic soldier emerges from this tunnel, not alive.” The soldiers grunted as they followed Quinn’s lead, quickly setting brief fortifications in the immediate confines of the brief entry space.

Vette announced that she would remain with the soldiers, "Too much testosterone following you already, Quinn, no thanks!"

Quinn nodded at her. "Lord Lusiel was pleased with your efforts at the power station, Vette. She promised a reward."

Vette beamed. Both her lekku bounced against her shoulders, even. "Yea, well. I kicked ass, so it makes sense." Then she glanced over at Pierce, grinning. Mainly to needle the poor lieutenant’s jealous energy. "What about Lieutenant Pierce? Does he get any rewards?"

Quinn frowned. "She said he was obviously a great soldier. Her estimation of his capabilities proved correct, of course. Are we prepared to proceed, then?" The men moved forward silently, Quinn and Pierce leading the way through the dark length of tunnel. Not that Quinn appeared intimidated in the least. He moved precisely, certainly. As if his every thought was on reaching the end of the tunnel just as quickly as he could manage; Pierce wondered how much the haste driving Quinn was inspired by the sounds of female shouts and calls and heavy, thudding booms coming from ahead of them.

Pierce admonished, "You don't know that Faraire'll use this tunnel to try and escape, captain. This entire effort could be a monumental waste of time."

"You're correct, lieutenant. Faraire could be as recklessly stupid as any common soldier. I am doubtful of that, however. So we'll ensure his possible escape is blocked." Quinn motioned forward.

Pierce glared at him. "Are you calling me stupid, captain?"

"I believe I pointed out just a moment ago I agreed with Lord Lusiel's estimation of your capabilities as a soldier, in fact. But if you feel you're stupid, I won't argue with you."

Behind them, Hurdenn muffled a small hoot of amusement. Pierce clenched his jaw, not entirely certain which one of them he wanted most to pummel right then. He opted for the safer bet, and ignored them both. Quinn stopped suddenly, when her voice finally echoed down the tunnel, past its entrance where light was spilling from inside.

"You’re beaten, general."

Faraire sounded desperate when he responded, "I can't believe it. You destroyed it like it was nothing. All this work, everyone who died. It was all for nothing." Then there was a pause. "Well, I won’t let you destroy _me_ at least. Every good leader has an exit strategy, you understand …”

Pierce grunted at Quinn as they listened to the sounds of pattering boots running towards the tunnel where they were just beginning to exit. Because Quinn was a damned pansy-assed officer, even if was proved right when Faraire rushed straight for the tunnel where they were coming along. Pierce grumbled sourly, "I really don't like you, captain. Just wantcha to know that." Quinn hardly cared, so he only shrugged. And then Faraire stumbled around the corner, shouted in surprise when he saw the barrel of Pierce’s blaster held up to meet his forehead.

“What … Who are you? Where did you come from? How did you even get in here?”

Pierce groused at the general, thumbing with his blaster to compel him back into the room, “Don’t you dare make me say his name. Bad enough you had to do just as he guessed you would, you damned Republic schtuper.” The general gasped. He stumbled backwards into the room again, barely avoiding the press of the blaster barrel against his forehead as Pierce prodded him along. Quinn scanned the room quickly, saw the wreckage of a huge war droid smoking in the center of the room. Jaesa stood just in front of the giant wreck, her lightsaber staff held up in front of her and still glimmering with golden brilliance.

Then Lusiel stepped forward, into Quinn's line of sight. He scanned her quickly, but she was obviously unscathed. She smiled at him and he felt the tension of the past several hours abruptly ease from his torso, felt his shoulders settle and ease. As if a burden was suddenly taken from him, just seeing her stepping there in front of him. She lifted her chin, "I suddenly remember Balmorra, Quinn. At least this one wasn’t a Jedi, hmm? How did I put it last time, then?"

Quinn smiled, “I believe you said something about kissing me. It was highly inappropriate at the time, as I recall.” Lusiel chuckled, “Is it more appropriate now, then?” But Quinn shook his head, smiling coolly. Fairare’s head bounced back and forth between the pair of them, following the banter. But then he scowled angrily.

"Fine, then. I’ve surrendered. I expect to be accorded the treatment promised prisoners in the Treaty of Coruscant."

Lusiel lifted one pointed finger, shaking it towards him like he was some small child in a classroom being brought to task. "That would work, if I ever considered you my prisoner. Or maybe not, really. But the fact remains, you are only a casualty of this conflict; another sad victim who fell in battle. They will likely give you an medal for it, even." She smirked at him, “Don’t you feel proud?”

Faraire managed to gasp, one last breath of air. Then Lusiel reached out to grip his neck in her own Force grip, lifted him off the floor so that he dangled there in the air. The Imperials gathered around the general, watching silently as he grabbed his neck, tried desperately to relieve the pressure on his windpipe, his throat – he was kicking, kicking, and gasping out every brief drop of air in his lungs. Pierce sneered as the general lost control of his bladder, just as he finally shuddered one last time and died, “So generals die just as ugly as everybody else. Good to know, I suppose.” Hurdenn stepped daintily around the general’s corpse, his lips hard-compressed as he bit back against the bite of nausea in his own throat.

Hurden gamely ignored the dead man on the floor beside him, as he nodded to Lusiel, “Congratulations, my lord. This marks an incredible victory, your name will surely be heard in the halls of the Dark Council itself. I hope you will count me as one of your closest allies."

Quinn scowled at the blatant political maneuvering. It was too obvious, too flagrant. Even brazen. Such motions should only be subtle -- they should be more careful and cautious; he could only assume Hurdenn was too overcome by his own queasy stomach and failed to _think_ , rather. That, or he was just stupid. But Lusiel quelled the flagrant proposal with a long, dark look of censure, “Perhaps I will. Perhaps not.”

Hurdenn ran a single finger along the collar of his uniform jacket, gulping slowly with nervousness and inhaling slowly, "I will at least provide you support in the meantime, my lord. Lieutenant Pierce has proved a valuable asset to you here on Taris; I thought you would welcome him under your own command, too.” Hurdenn bowed his head, looking more like a supplicant begging for mercy than a strong officer in the Imperial military. Lusiel glanced towards Pierce.

"You're meant for greater things than this broken world offers, lieutenant. I will expect your utter obedience to me, your loyalty and your final determination. Do you understand?" Lusiel’s eyes narrowed at him only softly. Pierce found himself thinking yet again of those smooth chocolate candies crafted in expensive shops in the finer sections of New Adasta. The ones filled with rich syrup and small red fruits, no less. His favorite sweets.

Pierce almost hummed as he assured her, "You won't be disappointed, my lord." Then Quinn stepped closer, until he stood only a little behind Lusiel as he gestured towards Pierce, "Then fall in line, lieutenant. So that I can explain your duties and responsibilities aboard the Black Wing during transport back to the platform."

Pierce rolled his eyes, far more unobtrusively than Hurdenn’s bumbling overtures. He muttered, "Oh, yea. Can't wait. Captain."


	63. Preening

Jaesa perched in a meditative pose on the floor within the circle of comfortable seating in the lounge, curled in a soft ball in the center of a bright red carpet set between the couches. She breathed slowly, methodically, so that anyone who saw her would think she only practiced at calming her mind. But she really watched the two men as they moved from room to room on the ship. Not for any interest in Quinn's explanation of the ship's working. No, Jaesa was fascinated with the burly lieutenant who dutifully followed the captain through the ship, rather.

Pierce was rough and unrefined; like a Nerf bull, that paws and chews in the middle of a field to show its best muscles and figure to whatever female might be watching. He was direct, confrontational during the gathering in Moff Hurdenn’s command center, and he snapped and snarled at Quinn several times that she saw. He amused her.

It wasn’t that Jaesa disliked Quinn, either. The masculine competitiveness between the two men simply tickled her. Quinn's stubborn sophistication clashed so spectacularly with Pierce's uncivilized coarseness. That, and Pierce was just so _different_ from the captain. She liked it, liked watching him.

Pierce was big. His chiseled face was strong-looking, robust … determined. Vette mentioned he was wounded destroying an entire battalion of Republic soldiers to prove himself to her master, and Jaesa enjoyed picturing that in her mind – Pierce standing tough and firm in the front of an onslaught as men died all around him. Even his coloring was impressive, all fiery, red like a storm on Korriban might look maybe. Heady sensations filled her as she only considered it, burning tendrils of desire that curled through her belly.

Jaesa pondered the uses and means to which she could put the lieutenant. He wouldn’t be so easily broken, not like that last sap of a soldier she met during their most recent visit to the Fleet. Lusiel wasn’t pleased afterwards, either.

_"I think we were … together. Or I killed him. Or both, maybe. I can't really remember," Jaesa told her, confusedly._  
_"But was he important? Was he valuable?" Lusiel asked._  
_"Master? I don't know. Yes? Or maybe?"_  
_"Then you wasted what might have proved a valuable asset, a tool that could have been put to some use. You lacked control; you can’t even tell me the simplest degree of understanding who and what the man was. A Sith who lacks control is weak, Jaesa. They are the ones most easily destroyed."_

Jaesa watched Pierce now, the way he strode along behind the captain with his face carefully blank and appropriately attentive. Jaesa thought he was likely bored and only avoided admitting it. He was certainly more hardy and resilient than that other soldier on the Fleet, too. His muscular shoulders and chest were broader; he looked strong, significant – good and delicious, even. Like the most scrumptious meal and so worth tasting. She decided that she wanted him.

Maybe she should ask Lusiel firstly. Was it better to ask for forgiveness or permission, she pondered. Because if she broke _this_ soldier, Lusiel would likely be far more bothered. Jaesa was pretty certain Pierce had some sort of value to Lusiel.

She looked at Pierce again, the way his legs swelled against his armor. And she sighed.

"My lord?" Quinn asked her suddenly, disrupting Jaesa’s meandering thoughts. She cursed silently, that the officer had noticed she was aware and watching them. Sith should not be so easily judged by someone who lacked the Force, she thought. Quinn waved towards her, gesturing for Pierce’s benefit, "Lieutenant, this is Jaesa Willsaam, Lord Lusiel's apprentice. They often train here in the lounge. It's necessary to traverse the space carefully during their sessions."

Jaesa rose to her feet, so that her robes swirled smoothly over her legs and feet. Her eyes gleamed brilliantly yellow deeply in her face, as she smiled at Pierce, "Hello, lieutenant. Is that what I should call you? Or is it Pierce?"

Pierce nodded at her. She still appeared over-young to him. But he'd made careful note of her deadly skill, too. This was not a creature to take lightly, Pierce thought. He murmured carefully, uncertain how to really handle a Sith’s apprentice, "I'll answer to either, my lord."

"Good. Then I'll call you Pierce." Jaesa turned and left the lounge, her hips swaying lightly as she went. She knew they watched her go, but Jaesa refused to glance back at the lieutenant. Even if she did want to.

* * *

 

The mess was simple enough, a large center table with chairs gathered all around and counters and cooking devices that lined the walls. It might have been the properly clean and most tidy of dining areas on any Empire vessel. Except for the crew, which was so beyond typical Pierce was very frankly bemused as he tramped inside the room.

The droid chattered inanely and constantly, all decked out in the most outlandish gear he had ever observed. Vetter was actually tying a formal cloth around Toovee’s geared neck at the moment, some garish monstrosity with yellow polka dots on it. Pierce stared at it, wondering where she had found the thing.

"Where's the captain?" Pierce asked as he sat down at the table, glancing around through narrowed eyes.

"Why? Are you trying to hide from him?" Vette didn't look up from her effort to fix Toovee's new apparel. She seemed mostly matter-of-fact, rather than even amused. Or maybe it was only that Toovee’s tie preoccupied her.

"Yes," Pierce growled. His gruff response did manage to amuse the twi'lek and she laughed at him. Pierce twisted his nose into a grimace as he glared at the little blue female, but then Jaesa ambled through the door. She was carefully attired in a satiny-looking red robe, with black trim. It would’ve been a decent-enough choice for the Nexxus Club back in Kaas City, Pierce imagined. Not that he’d ever set foot inside the Nexxus Club, common git that he was. But that’s how fine Jaesa looked right then.

Vette whistled as Jaesa passed her, watched the apprentice ease herself into a seat against the other end of the table opposite of Pierce. She didn’t look at him, though. Just checked over her place setting with the most precise inspection. Vette shrugged then, answering Pierce finally, "Quinn is checking on Lord Lusiel. I think she said her head was hurting, so he took her to the med bay earlier."

"For a headache?" Pierce sneered with disbelief. Far more likely the dandified prick of a captain was tupping the Sith Lord off in private, than that creature was debilitated with a simple pain in the head.

Jaesa smilingly shook her head, "Lord Lusiel can normally persist even through her pain, uses it to strengthen her Force abilities. Pain heightens the experience, fires one to even greater levels of anger and rage. It’s exhilarating.” She looked down towards her plate as Toovee approached the table with a thick platter, “But it's important we don't allow my master’s headaches to progress too far without caring for them."

Vette sniffed loudly, "Whatever your Sithy nonsense, blah. She just doesn’t eat right. Quinn's the only one who can manage to get her to sit still long enough to eat a good meal.” Vette bounded towards the table, practically jumping into a seat, “But that last battle was hurried. I don't think he managed to get her to eat before she rushed off to fight Faraire." She waved at Toovee.

Pierce watched as the droid proceeded to place platters in the middle of the table, not even once buttering the food with the fringes of his pretty polka-dot tie. And the food _was_ tempting. Nerf sausages wrapped in hotcakes, topped with vweilu nuts and smeared with spice jelly, with Corellian potato sticks and mounder potato rice. Pierce leaned over his place setting to steadily consume every serving on his plate eagerly.

Vette watched Pierce shovel large spoonfuls towards his mouth, and she grinned, "Hey, you eat a lot. We'll have to increase food stores more than I'd imagined."

"He is rather large," Jaesa regarded Pierce with her weird yellow eyes. He looked at her, swallowed the potato he was chewing on. She appraised him slowly, slowly, and he gradually smiled in return.

"Is that a problem?" Pierce asked.

"Not at all." Jaesa smirked across the table with sultry invitation.

Vette watched them from where she sat at the end of the table. She grumbled sourly as she rolled her eyes, "Great. It's just you and me, Toovee."


	64. Coded Codes

The transmission was coded, a standard used by Imperial intelligence. Quinn easily solved the algorithms which obscured the message. He wasn't certain who Lusiel's contact in Intelligence was – even the message he intercepted was bare of any names and certainly no images. It was obvious the communication was regular, though. And dreadfully familiar, even intimate. Just a smooth voice, with an Imperial accent that practically purred every line and word.

Quinn struggled with the discomfiture, that he could not discern who she was relying upon so ordinarily for information. At least outside his own consideration. He should be able to know who it was, at least. And what other sources did she use, he wondered.

_"You finally utilized your Molotar appropriately. I was wondering when you’d remember its defensives attacks could so simply break my Houjix. Although you left its rear exposed, so my Monnok is moved to that grid now. Guard it better, Lou!”_

_"And when’s the last time you knew me to do as you said? I went ahead and examined your captain’s background, regardless. You’ll be gratified to know he is appropriately honest about his history and lineage. The man was wasted on Balmorra for three years. I’m told a certain Moff who put him there was listed killed and deceased. So you have to tell me what you intend for this smart captain of yours. Is he important to us?"_

_"So respond quickly. I enjoy our little games of dejarik, but we’ll have to meet up again very soon. I’ll be watching for you."_

The male voice was transparent with concern, a teasing lilt to the words. Whoever he was, he _cared_ for Lusiel. Quinn felt a twinge of jealousy, thinking she was depending on information some former lover was providing. She was always quick to utilize whatever assets she could gain, anyway.

But it didn't seem an overly romantic message, regardless. There was something about it that struck him as … familiar, without being lover-like. Perhaps the pet name. Who would think to call a dangerous Sith Lord such a simple term? Quinn squirmed slightly in his chair, tapping his fingers against the armrest as he thought.

So Quinn focused on the information in the message, rather than boggle over who the sender really was. It was obviously a code spun intricately inside another code; and well-practiced, to boot. He had no doubt Lusiel would understand precisely what warning the message conveyed, what information the sender was transmitting. Quinn knew that Darth Vengean had a fleet of vessels he was sending to the Fringe Systems – was that the Molotar the message described? Or was it Monnok? What exactly was Lusiel supposed to defend and from whom?

Quinn bent over the consoles again, rapidly pulling up as much information as possible that described the Republic’s admiral called Monk. He carefully produced a pertinent and detailed report on the man, something for Lusiel to review before ever stepping foot nearby the Fringe Systems. He wouldn’t allow her to be caught off-guard, not by anything so much as a smidgeon of detailed information.

Then he leaned back in his chair to look out the viewscreen at the passing stars outside. The gentle pulse of air from the vents was soothing, and Quinn blinked tiredly as he sat there. But he only stretched before resuming his work again.

Because Baras was expecting yet another report that described Lusiel’s motions. Quinn needed to focus on every word he uttered, every look he shared. All of it conveyed a level of insight to Darth Baras which might be used to harm her. So Quinn took exceptional care to allay whatever sense of the Darth’s, that Lusiel was anything other than a loyal follower and apprentice. He had to protect her, had to shield her.

Quinn ignored the heavy sense of dread in the pit of his stomach.


	65. And we thought Nar Shaddaa was bad

"Don't you turn your back on me! You're going to answer for this!"

Lusiel turned around to face Moff Masken once again, incredulous. She tried to remember the last time _anyone_ had gall enough to address her so brusquely, Moff or no. As if he was anything close to her equal, that he could demand even her simplest presence there in front of him. The man’s temerity astounded her, enough she found herself spinning around to face him before she could stop herself.

Well, there was Moff Broysc. But that fool was stupidly insane, in fact.

But the wash of Masken’s emotions, the angry rage that consumed him and made him so reckless right then – that brilliant sense filled her as soon as she considered him again. He wasn’t insane, he wasn’t stupid. He was righteously angry! It was like touching a burning inferno, feeling the warmth of the Force itself for just one long moment. If the Moff were a user of the Force, he might actually prove a challenging opponent right then. Simply stunning, Lusiel thought. Not that it would help him, now.

It didn’t even matter how justified his feelings were; didn’t matter that she had laboriously fought her way to the Moff’s bridge, stepping over the bodies of his soldiers all along the way. Even the men she had saved were immaterial right then. Blisteringly justified, or not – Moff Masken was a dead man standing there. No Sith could tolerate such frank defiance of their rule and authority. Not without facing accusations of weakness, ineffectuality … an enemy took advantage of every perceived weakness, so Lusiel never invited charges of flawed limitations or sensibilities. No, there was no Moff who would become a chink in her own armor.

And it didn’t even matter how much Lusiel deplored the blatant waste of men and resources, either. This move of Baras’ was typically underhanded, the opening salvo in his motion to subvert Darth Vengean before finally and maybe challenging him. Lusiel rather supposed he would use _her_ like a short, fleeting stick to finally destroy Vengean long before he would ever face his master down, rather. The bastard that Baras was – he was little more than a sad, sick and fat spider hiding in the shadows, gnawing and chewing on its more gross meals.

No, Moff Masken was only another sorry tool that Baras likely forgot even as he directed the man to this place, so that he could be destroyed. Just another military man tossed on the fires between two Sith lords scheming for every bit of power they could steal. Lusiel might have assured him that eventually, finally she would cut Baras clean in two for everything about him that offended her. And that she would do it directly and to his face. Or mask, rather. She only doubted the Moff would find it any sort of comfort. So she refrained from providing the poor fool that much assurance.

What should she have said, after all? "I'm sorry I didn't send you a message telling you your fleet was probably, maybe and possibly headed into a trap, good sir." Nope, no good ring to that sort of message, she thought. Especially when all she could offer him until the attack started was her own hunch, rather than raw data or reports.  Even her own brother wasn't able to locate insights that would've convinced the Moff in time enough.

And, really. It should be Darth Vengean who long since suspected Baras would behave so brashly. What sort of Sith lord, of such prodigious rank and experience, would make this kind of drastic mistake? Maybe Vengean was only becoming too old to know better.

There really was a lesson in all of this, Lusiel decided. Deception and betrayal could come from the least likely of sources and just when you were most convinced it wouldn't happen, to boot. She would definitely have to remember this. Maybe Quinn would agree to include it as a note in one of his reports.

Well, perhaps Lusiel might say something to the Moff right then. He was yelling and raging across the length of the bridge, anyway. “Kill the Sith! Darth Vengean will reward us for this victory at least!” Lusiel snorted, deciding that pithy apologies were definitely not worth the time or effort at the moment.

So she didn’t tell him she was sorry. Didn’t tell him she would remember him later. She didn’t say such power plays were never her own style. She certainly did not say it wasn’t anything of her, that made for his men to die there in the Fringe Systems and far from their homes and families. She never even said it was all Darth Baras, convincing Vengean to overextend his fleets.

She didn’t say _anything_ as she released her lightsaber on every last one of them. She only let her blade sing and sing.

* * *

 

Lusiel grumbled sourly through the mask covering the lower half of her face. So she could breathe, mind you! “And here I thought Nar Shaddaa was nasty.” Another illusion that died abruptly just as soon as the shuttle departed and left them standing there on the surface of Quesh. The sky overhead was darkly yellow and swirling, all gassy soot and muck-ridden. She'd been told it was poisonous, in fact. Hence an entire series of shots and treatments on the station above that were designed, apparently, to keep her skin from melting completely from her bones. But none of it was enough to really hide the stench of the world. Or the view of it from her line of sight, she thought, eyeing one particularly tall, towering smokestack spewing some sort of noxious smoke into the yellow decayed-looking air.

Several soldiers trotted by her, their breathing apparatus masking the entire length of their faces. Lusiel stared after them, shaking her head. Poor chumps. At least she wouldn’t be here so long. Only one man to kill, and she was free to never look on Quesh’s pretty landscape again. Hopefully.

Behind her, Quinn gave a short cough. She glanced back at him, admired the turn of his head as he considered the map he had uploaded onto his datapad. Even in the dim glow of Quesh's sun through the swirling gas above and with the breathing mask that obscured much of his face, his features excited her. She smiled slightly.

Not surprisingly, it was Quinn who managed to discern some word describing where Admiral Monk had probably retreated on Quesh. One of the officers he approached during their medical session on the orbital station described a larger than average number of ships bringing Republic troops to one of the nearby bases. “Admirals do not travel singly, my lord. If Monk is retreating from the battle overhead, that’s the most likely location.” Now he gamely plotted a course to the place. Lusiel hoped to bypass as much of the sludge as possible, as she watched a single Imperial officer climb wearily off a speeder on the other side of the transportation pathway. The man was covered head to toe in thick, gooey green slime.

"Quinn! I’d wager real credits this is what the surface of Nal’Hutta looks like! Only think, Hutt planets, all of them are just plastered with the slugs’ excrement! I just knew that’s why they stink so much!" Lusiel kicked her boots over the metallic surface of the transport platform as she gauged her speeder critically. Quinn only eased his mouth into a half-smile as he followed her.

* * *

 

Quinn stood silently behind Lusiel as yet another Republic soldier collapsed dead at her feet, gurgling some final gasping breaths as he went. He lifted a pained hand into the air, as if grasping for the last bit of his life. But all he saw was the Sith looming above him, and watching him die. Lusiel was covered in slimy bits of blood and gore, the remnants of Monk’s soldiers that she had climbed over and around to reach the doors in front of them now. She looked up when the screeching whine of the door opening sounded through the space, breathed hard from exertion as she waited with her lightsaber held out to the side of her.

Quinn heard them gasping from inside the room, imagined the darkly mesmerizing sight of Lusiel from that side of the door. She was the most beautiful thing in his world, was fast _becoming_ his world. And he still believed he'd lose his breakfast if he saw her look at him the way she was looking at the men standing there – three men, all garbed in Republic officers' uniforms.

One of the men pushed himself ahead of the others, angrily pointing at the floor as he demanded, "What do you think you're doing?” The admiral insignia on his uniform glinted dully in the muddy air of the place. He shook his head, hard enough the mustache over his mouth quivered against his face. “What? Is Baras trying to make things look good, give himself an alibi? Well, you can tell him mission accomplished, then! You killed almost all of my men! Now back off!"

Quinn saw Lusiel shrug softly from out of the corner of his eye, slowly rolling her shoulder as she prepared to meet the slow-to-understand admiral. Neither one of them felt any sense of surprise, not even learning Monk was so much different than Commander Rylon back on Balmorra. Rylon, at least, faced his imminent destruction with equanimity and mutual respect; he didn’t cower or begrudge Lusiel for the task of weeding him out.

Monk was no Rylon. Unfortunate, Quinn thought as he stepped closer to Lusiel and slowly palmed his own blaster. Monk blanched suddenly, his eyes darting wildly between Lusiel and Quinn, "Wait, he sent you here to kill us, didn't he?” Monk raised up both his hands, incredulous, “But _why_? My cover is intact! It’s been well over a decade since we defected and we've served him all along. Why would he waste us so baldly?"

"Why would you expect anything else? Everyone’s use is eventually diminished, and the use of those who’ve proven their disloyalty is even cheaper.” Lusiel lazily swung her lightsaber around to her front, so that the blade’s crimson glow splashed over her face, highlighted her dark eyes. “This is the eventual fate of every spy, _admiral_. Accept it with boldness."

Quinn's mind went white with the glaring thought of his own spying. _She would hate him_ , he thought. It occurred to Quinn suddenly, that the thought of facing her lightsaber wasn’t half so painful as the thought she would hate him. He’d rather die, he realized. But the skittering motions of his thoughts only blinded Quinn to the sudden frenzy of motion in front of him, as Lusiel stiffened and Monk yelled out for his officers to fight her.

Lusiel waited, though. She wanted Monk to die last, so that he knew how total his failure really was, how badly he had erred in furthering Baras’ aims. Right then, Monk was nothing more to her than an extension of Baras himself. Like an arm she was determined to lop clean off at the elbow. So let the lopping commence, and she smiled meanly.

Lusiel leaped through the Force, her lightsaber flaring brightly in a blazing arc of fiery promise as she sped through the air towards Monk’s officers. The song rose high above their heads, echoed through the murky confines of the room.

And then she struck solidly into the first man, the tip of her saber entering his chest in a blazing rush of pain and blood as he yelled out a shocked scream and started falling. Lusiel merely stepped over his body even before it was finally still and unmoving on the ground in front of her, swiping fast towards the second officer so that the fancy Republic insignia lining the upper chestplate on his front went flying away in a swoosh of blood and bone. The man stared down at his open chest through bulging eyes, in terrible shock and frozen in place for a long, long moment, and then he toppled down into a dead heap.

Only then did Lusiel spin around to face Monk. But she wasn’t fast enough. Even as the admiral was scrambling to hide, to duck into a more defensive huddle behind a series of crates, Quinn was moving. He stepped directly behind Monk and placed the very end of his blaster barrel almost tenderly against the back of the man’s skull. Monk froze, his eyes widening with surprise as he gaped towards Lusiel through burbling lips, “No! This isn’t right, it isn’t _fair_ …!” Quinn only coldly pressed his finger around the trigger then and sent the bolt blazing through Monk’s head. Even as he did it, he imagined that someday, someday – someone would likely do the same thing to him.

Monk’s head dissolved in a gush of blood and bits of bone and a loud, wet squelching sound. It was too much all at once, spraying in a strangely discordant direction backwards instead of out the front of Monk’s skull. Quinn thought absently, that the bolt likely impacted and bounced backwards off the front of Monk’s temple, in fact. The result was a thick, grotesque splash of blood that covered and soaked Quinn’s entire face and neck, spilling down in a gory mess all along his front. He spluttered and gagged around the splotches of Monk’s blood that landed on his lips, even inside his mouth.

Quinn danced and sidestepped in a chaotic rush of panicked motions, trying to clean his mouth with desperate swipes of both his hands. He looked like a gizka creature running in circles minus its head, Lusiel thought, and she laughed as she stood there watching him. “Oh, Quinn. You always manage the most delicious entertainments. Do you think you can do it again?” She laughed even harder when he turned to her and glared hard, reprovingly.

* * *

 

"What's wrong, Quinn?"

"Nothing at all, my lord."

Lusiel sighed as she glanced towards her captain sitting next to her on the shuttle. The vessel climbed steadily through the thick yellow morass of Quesh’s atmosphere, which she had watched through the window next to her with tremendous satisfaction as it slowly receded. Now she considered Quinn, remembered the burst of upset feelings he had endured earlier.

At least he was somewhat cleaner now, she thought, although his clothes were still stained with blood-splatters. But he had carefully wiped his face and mouth as clear of blood as possible. Lusiel avoided mentioning the droplets of blood that clumped in his hair, though. She wanted to wait until the teasing was most effective, rather. Now it was more that she needed to think, how to respond to Quinn’s anxiety.

Describing her own feelings was … strange, and weird. Lusiel was surrounded constantly by beings capable of gauging the strength and power of emotions, to use them towards their own benefit, to heighten them or quash them as needed – she was only barely made an acolyte on Korriban, just shy of her eighth naming-day, when she first learned the value and necessity of erecting barriers against her own feelings. Even when she slept, even when her sleep roiled with the worst nightmares, Lusiel’s mind was hidden behind her own crafted shields. Armor for her mind that she never allowed to break. She certainly didn’t know how to _explain_ a feeling, not to anyone or ever.

So how did she say to Quinn, “I just don’t care.” It helped that Quinn wasn’t really Baras’ man, not anymore. Quinn’s reports were only carefully crafted devices he used to keep Baras blind, rather. It amused Lusiel to read them, if only because she could see his protectiveness and his care through every word, every gesture that he made in those transmissions. She certainly never lacked access to the reports, either. Her brother wouldn’t have allowed such a thing; he’d long since ensured Lusiel could review every single transmission through her ship’s systems.

No, Lusiel considered every report Quinn made, from the very first one. And even then he was startling focused on preventing Baras from harming her. It was dreadfully attractive of him, at the time. Eventually, it became more.

Lusiel could practically track Quinn's falling in love with her according to those reports. She had seen by what he left out, what he changed or otherwise worded oh so carefully what it was that moved him, what concerned him. At least where she was concerned. Watching the way his mind worked, listening to his words describing her – those reports proved precious to her.

Of course, Lusiel also learned even greater levels of hatred towards her master, as well. Baras was a slug. Slimier than Quinn was, even after slogging through Quesh fields and bathing in Monk’s blood, to boot. Although that wasn’t so much a bad idea, either … Baras rolling around in Quesh slime would be appropriate enough, anyway. Lusiel idly tantalized herself with the fantasy imagery. Then she smilingly glanced at Quinn from the corner of her eye.

"Quinn?"

"Yes, my lord?" He glanced at her.

"I'd like you to do something for me."

"Of course, my lord. Anything."

"I'm so _glad_ you said that! Because I want you to move all of your things into my quarters once we reach the ship."

Quinn almost fell out of his seat. Quite a feat considering he was strapped in.


	66. The Proper Steps

Pierce sat tensely against the game table in the corner of the lounge, Jaesa perched on the seat next to him. He barely noted the warm brush of Jaesa’s breaths across his upper arm as he glared across the table towards droid. But they both watched as Toovee moved one of the finely crafted chess pieces over two black spaces on the board. It was the third game Pierce had played with the droid and he was becoming purely frustrated. When Jaesa remarked to him during the meal, that Toovee was programmed for dejarik and chess both he bragged to her of his own skills.

But Jaesa only smirked at him, “Fine words. If you can beat Toovee, I’ll even be impressed.” So that’s why he was currently bent over the table and glaring at the blasted ship droid through no less than three matches. Fucking hunk of metal and wires sat across the table and stared impassively back at him from under a monstrosity of a wide-brimmed hat, even. The hat was violet-colored, no less! With a _feather_ attached to the side! Pierce felt like yanking the droid’s arms from its sockets at this point, rather than see it move another damned piece across the board.

Vette came bouncing into the lounge and caught sight of the three of them, just as Toovee trilled in its whiny voice, "I believe that’s a check, lieutenant!" She wandered over to stand there with her slender arms crossed over her chest, while Pierce harrumphed abruptly. Vette prodded the gleaming aluminium figure that represented the Supreme Chancellor as Toovee blandly returned the other game’s pieces to the starting point, "Hey, you're playing chess. Quinn was getting upset when he played with Toovee, too."

"What, it beat him just as soundly?" Pierce glanced up from where he’d morosely dropped his chin into his propped hand on the side of the table, eager-looking.

But the twi'lek shook her head, "Nah. He kept complaining he couldn't get the programming right, because he always won. Said Toovee didn't provide him challenge enough."

Pierce scowled, "Quinn. Damn him." Jaesa didn’t even try to smother her amusement, then. She chuckled as she reclined back against the lounge seat. Pierce glared at her, too.

Vette eyed Pierce carefully. She leaned forward, her eyes glinting conspiratorially, "You should help me find outlandish clothes for Toovee, Pierce."

"Why the hells would I do that?"

Jaesa examined the nails of one of her hands critically, explaining, "Because Quinn _hates_ it. Why else do you think Vette pesters him with the gambit? She finds the most absurdly outrageous attire for the droid, so Quinn is forced to sneak behind her to remove them. It's actually rather entertaining."

Pierce slowly began smiling, tapping his fingers on the surface of the table thoughtfully. Vette shook her head, muttering something under her breath that sounded like, "Men!" That's when the airlock doors suddenly banged open. Pierce jumped to his feet, spinning to face the doorway leading to the airlock even as he reached for his blaster. But he froze when Lusiel stormed angrily into the lounge, looking over her shoulder as she shouted, "You'll do as I tell you, captain!"

Quinn followed her through the door, stepping with careful precision. As if he feared the merest wrong step would result in a serious injury. "My lord, I wasn't refusing your direction, I assure you. I only said …"

"You said no!"

"Actually, my lord, I said …" Quinn suddenly caught sight of Pierce, Jaesa and Vette, all lined up near the chess board and all of them gaping. Toovee was still sitting blithely bored-looking in the chair, prepared for another round of chess. _The entire crew_ , he thought, horrified. "My lord, I'm not sure this is an appropriate time and place for this conversation."

Lusiel glared at him, her hand actually twitching against her waist. Maybe she would fling Quinn into a nearby wall, Pierce thought with wonderment. He suddenly wondered how to manage a recording of the event, eyed Toovee with a sideways glance.

"My lord, _please_. We're both filthy. We can discuss this issue on the bridge after we've cleaned up, perhaps?" Quinn regarded Lusiel, appealing. She ran her eyes down him, taking in the blood splattered all along his frame, along with remnants of the sludge and muck from the planet below. His hair was still clumped with dried blood and some flecks dotted his brow, too. She doubted she looked much better.

Lusiel snapped at him, "Ten minutes, captain. Not one moment longer."

"Of course, my lord." Quinn watched her stomp towards her quarters. Then he turned around.

"What the hell is going on?" Pierce demanded, staring. _What did you do_ , he wanted to know. They all did. Jaesa practically buzzed with curiosity and Vette only stood there with her mouth hanging wide open. Any other time, Quinn would've been satisfied to have accomplished such a feat, as robbing the twi’lek of speech. But he was actually frantic right then, rather.

"Return to your duties, lieutenant." Jaesa began to say something but Quinn held up a hand. "I'm sorry, but I don't have time for this." They watched as Quinn moved towards his own quarters.

Vette chirped and clapped her hands together, excitedly, "I'm gonna time this! Toovee, prepare a countdown!" She glanced down at her datapad. "Eight minutes, starting _now_!" The droid dutifully began reciting a backward count in its mechanically tinny voice. Pierce suddenly decided he wouldn’t rip the thing’s arms off, muttering with amusement, "Someone really needs to do something about that thing's voice, you know."

With one minute left to go on the count, Lusiel abruptly entered the lounge again. She stopped when she saw them still standing there. Her features had been scrubbed clean of blood and grime, her armor dropped onto the floor of her quarters, and her black hair was pulled back in its customary fashion. She crossed her arms over her chest when she saw them glancing at her.

Pierce grunted roughly, "Right. Back to chess, now." He plopped himself back into the bench seat and pretended fascination with the board, as Vette and Jaesa joined him. They probably would've managed a better nonchalance if Toovee wasn't still droning the countdown. Lusiel grumbled under her breath as she stalked past them towards the bridge.

Jaesa stared after her, "What could Quinn have done?"

"Maybe he shot the wrong guy down there? Or maybe he tripped into one of the nastier pools of Quesh slime? Maybe he stepped on a Hutt’s tail? Oh, maybe he didn’t want to eat at the local mess down there?" Vette tapped her fingers one by one as she considered each possibility.

The door to Quinn's quarters suddenly jerked open and he walked hurriedly into the lounge, ignoring them entirely as he moved quickly towards the bridge. His hair was still wet but combed back and he was fastening the buttons on what looked to be one of his better uniforms as he went along. Vette whistled approvingly as Quinn approached the door to the bridge, but he didn’t seem to even notice.

Toovee was chanting, "Eight, seven, six, five …" Quinn walked through the door.

* * *

   


Lusiel was standing in front of the galaxy map, facing the viewport. Her arms were curled across her abdomen as she stared out at the blackness. She looked over at Quinn as he entered the bridge, and the light of the map highlighted her creamy features. She looked almost translucent, like she was actually glowing as she stood there, and he caught his breath.

He tried joking with her, "According to Toovee, I made it in time, my lord."

But Lusiel only shrugged. She remarked, "I've never doubted your punctuality, captain." Quinn sighed. He should've known better than to tease her. Humor was not one of his better skills, at least.

Lusiel turned around to face him fully. "You don't want to share my quarters."

"That isn't what I said, my lord. I only pointed out that the crew might regard such an impropriety with negativity, that it could undermine your leadership and mine."

Lusiel stepped forward, growing angry again. But Quinn shook his head at her, suddenly vehement, "Damn it, Lusiel. I didn't mean to hurt your feelings!" She stopped and blinked at him, before turning away to look back at the viewport again. He dropped his gaze to consider the line of her spine in the Sith robe she was wearing, an older style she probably wore when she was a younger acolyte on Korriban. As if she was drawing comfort from something of her childhood. He sighed, stepping closer to her, "It's easy to forget you're not only the powerful, dynamic figure of a Sith. You’re a woman firstly, with a woman's emotional fervor and logic. I _am_ sorry."

Lusiel didn't look at him, merely shrugged. When she didn't say anything he took another step closer, until he could only just reach out to touch her. But he waited, asked her quietly, "Tell me, then. Why do you want me to move into your quarters?”

Lusiel grumbled, "I want you _close_ , damn you. I _love_ you, and I hate you for it."

Quinn actually understood.  She hadn't planned this; and couldn't control it.  And the thrill of knowing it shot down over his entire length. Until his body was taut and ready, his groin hard, and his blood sang in his veins. But he only breathed out slowly, "Well. Now you've said it, then." Quinn stepped up directly behind her, until his chest pressed into her and he could curl his arms all the way around her, pull her close enough his chin rubbed gently against the very top edge of her ear. "What did you say to me when I said the words, hmm? I'm glad, Lusiel. So very glad."

"But you won't share my quarters?" She sounded close to tears and he realized how difficult it must have been for her to even ask him for so much closeness, that she had hidden her insecurity behind a joking order. Of course he’d mistaken her teasing overture, never looking past the humor to see how tender she was stepping in the mere request.

Sith or not, she really was so much younger than him.

Quinn sighed. He turned her in his arms, so that he could look into her eyes. "That isn't what I said, however. I just …I needed to ask you first, rather. There are … proper steps to such things, I think." She frowned as he hesitated, saw him swallowing nervously. He seemed worried, tugged at his uniform jacket and grunted softly.

Lusiel canted her head slightly as she looked up at him, "Well, I'm all ears, Quinn."

He opted for formality. Of course he did. She could practically feel the abrupt decision, like a click in his head that almost sounded through the brief space. Like he was only comfortably safe in that familiar mannerism. It was endearing. And he intoned, "I'd be honored if you would marry me."

Lusiel sank back, surprised. She stared at him silently. Quinn ran his hands down along her arms until he held both her wrists gently in his hands, so she stayed close to him and couldn’t move away.

"I would be yours, would give you everything I am. I would fight every one of your battles, I swear it. There's nothing we can't achieve together," Quinn said, earnestly. But his nervousness ached through to her Force senses. Lusiel smiled at him, pulling one of her hands free so she could reach up to run her fingers along his jaw, toy with one of his ears, and push back some tendril of his dark hair along the side of his head.

"I'll marry you, Quinn."

Quinn burst into what seemed to be the biggest smile she'd ever seen on his face. There was pride there, and relief. _Her own Quinn_ , she thought. She had won him. And only Quinn could have accomplished such a heady surprise, stayed right ahead of her own plans and motions. He smiled at her, "You've made me very happy. Although it might have been better if you called me Malavai when you said that." He still enjoyed the sound of his familiar name whenever she said it.

She tapped a finger against his chin, leaning closer until she rested entirely against his front. His arms tightened around her, and she murmured, "I'll just call you husband. How's that?"

He shook his head. "Please. Don't."

"Or maybe 'hubby'".

"I know better than to take you seriously." He reached down to clasp her buttocks and pull her groin close enough to nestly up against his own. He gazed at her - serious, satisfied and utterly possessive. "I should return to my duties.”

“Do you want to?”

“No. Wife."

 


	67. Sith Clan proves itself Superior

Broonmark watched the pair of humans approach the lone Jedi left standing amidst the wreckage he'd made of his former clan's holdings.

He thought humans were ugly little creatures. They probably suffered some sort of blindness or at least limited vision, considering they only had two eyes. And they never seemed capable of finding him, either. They especially stumbled about whenever it grew dark outside, actually bumped into things in clumsy, choppy motions.

Then they lacked plush, wintry fur except for some brief mop of it on the top of their heads. It left them pathetically and obscenely bare-looking. And they shivered for it, too! Pitifully weak and barely worth sneering at, even. He had been told once that humans had brief spatterings of fur on their chests and legs, at least the males. But they kept such body parts all covered by cloths and metals, and the materials kept him from knowing for certain what kind of hair really blanketed them.

These humans included a female, though. He knew that much only because of her size and the two lumps on the front of her chest, which he was assured were used by female humans to feed their young. This one was not carrying any young with her, though, and her belly was flat and covered with thick plates glossed with a sheen designed to strengthen the metal from the cold. Everything covering her was colored the deepest black and burgundy red, even the cover over her head.

It was the female human that confronted the frightened, quavering Jedi – the one who’d been spinning in place looking for Broonmark and failing to find him through his two narrow, little eyes. He had flung aside his own head-covering, and even then proved utterly, completely and uselessly blind. It amused Broonmark to no end, so that he played with the human quite happily until the others appeared.

Broonmark tried judging the female. She was even smaller than most of the other human females he had managed to observe before, tiny like one of the brief rodents that hid in burrows under hard-packed snow. He could likely knock her down with a huffed breath of cold air! That was probably what made for the proximity of the other human, the male. He stayed close to her, almost looming against her back in a stiff, protective-looking stance.

Of course human females were also more helpless than the males. They required males that would guard them, defend them. Maybe keep them from those emotional outbursts they seemed so much prone to, until they even leaked water from their eyes!

No, Broonmark was not impressed by these two humans. The male only might be capable of a better fight than the female, if only because he was bigger and tougher than she was. The male was the greater threat, the one to defeat first. Perhaps the challenge would even be worthwhile. The female? She would most likely cry and whimper the pitiful bleats of sound humans seemed inclined to make whenever he appeared.

Broonmark inhaled, trying to catch their scents. He frowned when he managed it. They shared scents, indicating a level of closeness that came from sharing body heat even through the longest nights. Broonmark knew that humans didn't comfortably or willingly share body heat unless they were bonded, either as family or mates. These two particular humans might be related by blood, considering that the tendrils of fur he could see peeking from under the wraps and masks that covered their faces and heads was the same color – as black as the darkest, moon-dark night. But the way they moved, their defensiveness of each other indicated a degree of intimacy that didn’t match any sibling bond he had ever known. They were mated, Broonmark supposed.

That would make them more difficult to kill. A mate who knew his partner was threatened would fight harder; he would be enraged, protective. He would have to destroy the male quickly, and definitely first.

Then the Jedi began jabbering again. He was becoming even more tiresome, Broonmark thought. "Great, now a Sith shows up! First Xerender abandons me and now this! What did I do to deserve such trials?"  Sith. Broonmark had heard of the Sith. The Republic soldiers and the Jedi had described the Empire and its Sith rulers to Broonmark and his clan many times. According to them, the Sith were evil harbingers of death and destruction, who wantonly scourged the galaxy in foul quests for more power and strength.

The stories fascinated Broonmark, with their descriptions of violence and rapacious ruin the Sith glorified. But as he regarded the two dark-furred humans, Broonmark decided the tales were only allegory, myths designed to scare young into behaving appropriately. Because neither of these humans – most especially the tiny scrap of a female – could possibly demonstrate the dominance and power he had been told of such caricatures.

"Because of course I’m just Xerender's errand boy -- the one he leaves behind to die! Maybe he thought I’d slow down the blasted Talz, who knows? But Xerender isn’t here now,” the Jedi glared at the female. Not the male, he barely glanced back at him. He only yelled, "Defend yourself, Sith!"

Broonmark watched them in amazement. The Jedi’s weapon was one of the brilliant sticks they seemed to prefer, and it glowed with a buzzing whine. It arched over his head in vivid blue threat, quickly and smoothly angling towards the female. But then it stopped, screeching with a wail against the crimson red glare of the Sith’s own stick. The Sith stepped forward, almost flowing like the dewdrops of melting ice, pushing back the Jedi's attack and moving him away from her male companion. The Sith’s male pulled loose a slender blaster pistol as he jumped backwards.

The two lightsabers lit up the darkening space, flashing against each other and sparking strange shadows along the walls of the Talz tents that surrounded them. The Jedi fought hard but he was no match for the Sith, who's motion remained even, effortless. Absolutely beautiful. Broonmark had thought the Jedi he encountered were unparalleled warriors. The Sith showed him otherwise.

In mere moments, she had the Jedi on his knees, only stopping from killing him long enough to demand directions from him. The Jedi knelt down, moaning sullenly, "Bah, go ahead and kill me. I didn't want to die at the hands of the beast, anyway.”

The female sighed temperamentally, "What is it you’re going on about? Where exactly can I find Xerender?"

"Broonmark, he’s called! The Talz warned Xerender about him. He's a savage who seeks revenge on Fetzellen and the others for ousting him. Look around you – all this, all these dead Talz? Broonmark did this!" The Jedi waved around at the mounds of white, unmoving furred Talz, their blood drenching the ground in heavy splotches. "But did Xerender care? No, he just left and now Broonmark is in here somewhere, hunting me – wait, did you hear that? No! Gods, no!"

Broonmark dropped his cloak at the last possible second, his claws flashing quickly towards the Jedi’s neck. The Jedi lost, and his blood was the forfeit. At least he died fast, not even losing the contents of his bladder as he fell dead to the side. Broonmark spun around to face the Sith, then, even before the bubbling sound of blood spilling from the man’s neck filled the air. He held up his claws, threatening, "Sith! You leave now or you join the dead!"

She laughed at him! It was a pretty sound, actually. Like one of the small birds that greeted the sun’s rays every morning with a lilting tune across the white tundra. Broonmark was actually stunned enough to hesitate. The Sith leaned forward, smiling at him, "You can not scare me, creature."

"I can! All things know fear. Fetzellen fears. It's why he chose to fight with the Jedi Xerender, because he fears my vengeance," Broonmark threatened the Sith again. "Sith must not get in our way."

She only shook her head at him, pointed a dainty finger that didn't even have a worthy claw attached to it up at him. It almost brushed the springier bits of his fur! Like she was not worried at all that he could slice it straight away with only a brush of his smallest claw! She crooned at him, "You would be wise, rather, to stay out of _my_ way. My master seeks Xerender’s head, and I want to know why. Don’t interfere, beast."

Broonmark was enraged. No one had ever so blatantly threatened _him_ before. Certainly not some fur-less, obviously blind, and tiny little human female! It was intolerable! "Then we must beat respect from you!" He roared down into her face, watched her body’s frame tense as she prepared to defend herself.

But Broonmark suddenly twisted around, firing an electric flare from his generator towards the Sith’s male companion, watched it strike him. The male’s body seized, shuddered, and he screamed out in agonized pain as the current ripped through his flesh; he tried calling to her, “Lu ..” But the sound disappeared in the incredible whirring, rippling haze of electric power ravaging his body.

Broonmark warbled his victory sound and moved to make the killing blow before the male could manage to recover. But he was stopped solidly by a strange blow, a force that compelled him off his feet and flung him – flung him bodily through the air! He flew through the air, far, far, until he was very nearly on the farthest side of the cave, far from the humans. Broonmark landed hard on his back, with all the breaths in his lungs spent out in a terrible huff of pain and distress. He heard the female roaring as he went sailing away, too. And only now as he lay there did he really listen to it. A growling sound of rage and intention so primeval he actually felt a touch of fear himself.

Broonmark jumped to his feet, ignoring the agony in every muscle in his body as he pulled his vibrosword off from his back, and looked towards the female. And he froze. Broonmark had assumed the male was the stronger, more powerful foe, assumed he should kill the male first rather than inspire him to a wrathful protection of his mate. Looking at that small female standing over her companion, who was still twitching from the electricity attack of Broonmark's weapon, he realized suddenly he'd miscalculated where the real threat lay. It was an enraged _female_ he had to concern himself with, in fact.

He suddenly remembered the felines that dotted the snowy landscape outside. Smaller and sleeker than their male counterparts, they remained the dominant predatory animals in their packs. They viciously attacked any creature fool enough to move too close to their dens and hunted endlessly through the barren landscape for prey beasts. This female, this Sith – was like one of those cats. And she was furious.

Broonmark marveled. _This is what true death looks like when it stares at you_ , he thought. It was glorious!

The Sith jumped and flew through the air at him, her lightsaber flaring scarlet like it was blood-marked and deadly over her head. Broonmark watched her come, lifted his own pitiful sword. He knew he was going to die and he exulted, even warbled a cheer in Talzzi. He would meet his dying proudly, at least.

Then she landed, the strength of her blow bringing him down like a stone and thudding him down into the ground so that he lay there fighting to breathe all over again. He looked up at her, awed. The glow of scarlet light from her weapon shined over the faceplate obscuring her eyes and her black, black hair whirled loose from behind her, shaken free of its coils by her tremendous Force-powered leap. She snarled down at him, not like any human he had ever heard. More like the cats, all over again.

"The next time you make him scream, I'll cut you into the smallest pieces I can and then feed them to you before you die! And _that_ will take a long, long time!"

Broonmark swallowed against the pain of her standing on his chest now, actually. He nodded as best he could, though. "Sith clan proves itself superior," he said.

It was the closest to "sorry" he'd ever give her.

It was also the greatest compliment he would ever give _anyone_.


	68. Even Through the Force

Ensign Slinte fidgeted nervously only watching Commander Lanklyn work frantically over the holoterminal’s console. Although it really was easier watching Lanklyn, than it was to consider the looming image of Darth Baras over the terminal itself. Although how Baras managed to convey seething rage even through the flat, stark surface of the mask covering his face boggled the mind, it really did. Without a single word, though, it was obvious how incredible the Darth was fulminating right then.

_Damn the Jedi_ , Slinte thought, shooting the other figure over the holoterminal a thundering look through narrowed eyes. All of them! For an Order that persisted in calling itself noble and honorable, such taunting gestures made little sense. Didn’t this man know, the cost of his little joke? Lanklyn’s fingers were shaking, trembling, his frantic terror obvious – _this_ was Jedi nobility?

"Get this Jedi off my holo, Lanklyn. Now." Darth Baras didn’t shout or scream. He didn’t have to; the threat to Lanklyn’s life was utterly implicit in every. Single. Word. Slinte winced as Lanklyn began to splutter that he couldn’t manage it, that the Jedi called Xerender was actually tapped directly somehow into the station’s communication relays. And how had Xerender managed it, Slinte agonized.

Slinte squirmed and looked away, his feeling of fretful anxiety heightening. That was when he noticed Darth Baras' apprentice come into the room, her Imperial captain right behind her.

She didn't even glance at him, focusing the whole of her attention on her master. Braver than Slinte was, obviously. Slinte was still trying to forget Darth Baras was _visible_ right then. So he noted how much worn Lord Lusiel and the captain looked. There was even some slight tightening, maybe a pained grimace on the Imperial’s face. It could be little more than the climate outside, however. The temperatures and weather on Hoth tended to invariably fray the strongest composure, he thought.

"As your Imperial lackeys have no doubt informed you, the Talz are easily keeping me one step ahead of you," Xerender continued with his taunting refrain. Slinte wanted to shout at him to only shut up. But he just clenched his fists together and dropped his gaze down towards the floor.

Baras' apprentice leaned forward, studying the Jedi’s face. Slinte thought she looked rather lovely with the glow from the holoterminal highlighting her features. Of course he’d been admiring her since she first arrived on-planet, the way her dark hair gleamed ebony against the backdrop of snow and ice all around her. Her lips were particularly pink and pouty, plump lips that bent into easy smiles as her captain prepared her for the cold outside the doors; she even _joked_ with the man!

Now she didn't smile, though. "So this is the Jedi I'm going to kill," she said to Darth Baras. Lord Lusiel said it like it was already done, rather. Slinte felt the thrill of it all the way down to his toes, and very nearly cheered towards her.

Xerender sighed, "Baras’ lapdog returns. If your trainer knows what's good for him, he'll muzzle you, girl." The Jedi was far more … direct than any Jedi Slinte had observed before, actually. He sounded more like a Sith right then. Xerender pointed at them, "I'm not here for a reunion, Baras. The last time we met, you were left drained and weaponless. This time you won't be so lucky."

The Jedi's image abruptly faded. Slinte breathed in deeply as Darth Baras faced them firmly, stiffening in preparation. He wasn't even Sith and he could feel the Darth's rage like it was a palpable entity stretching across the breadth of space dividing them. Lanklyn actually started begging, begging.

It was so much futile, of course. Darth Baras reached out, throwing his power over the Force to grab Lanklyn up and shake him through mid-air. Lanklyn kicked desperately, scrabbling and whining as he scratched at his throat for even the smallest breath. Darth Baras cursed him as he died, too, "I do not tolerate such blatant failure, Lanklyn." It seemed to take forever. Slinte watched the entire thing, watched Lanklyn fall down onto the floor with a heavy, terrible thudding sound, and he fought desperately to keep the sour contents of his stomach in his _stomach_.

Slinte wasn't sure what was worse. Watching Lanklyn die. Or hearing Darth Baras tell him he was taking Lanklyn's place, "Don't screw it up … Commander."

* * *

 

Lusiel smiled meanly towards the advozse pirate-turned-black-marketeer, “That lightsaber will earn you nothing but a painful, burning death today. One might believe the thing’s cursed, before I’m done.” The alien turned to look at her, grimacing through a toothy smile that tried to look tough. Lusiel imagined his single, thick horn in the center of his forehead was like a Reek’s; like the advozse would suddenly paw against the ground and then charge at her in a mad, raging rush to try impaling her.

She considered pantomiming fearful anxiety, maybe waving her hands through the air and chanting, “Ohhh, I’m so scared, come get me.” But she thought the joke would fall terribly flat there among the sundry pirates haggling over the price of Baras’ old lightsaber. She was more interested in knowing how her master had managed to lose the thing, regardless. More than she was even vaguely concerned in mocking the pirates that had it right now.

Lusiel did appreciate the subtle irony, of the Force leading her to the lightsaber clutched in the hands of some skinny runt of a pirate, though. Of _course_ Xerender followed it, too. Two apprentices, still fighting their old masters’ battle ... How perfect! There was a nuance to this play, here – facing down pirates and Talz alike, all forging towards a final, devastating convergence; conflict and battle as it was meant to be.

Lusiel looked forward to meeting Xerender and his master, felt driven to it, compelled. She whispered back through the Force, towards whatever call it was – she whispered to him, “ _Be careful what you ask for. Ask for company, ask to be found and you_ will _get it._ ” She would not allow Baras to have the power she sensed, let alone some sorry Jedi Knight that once defeated him. Master Wyelett should have stayed under Hoth’s snows, buried and alone. She _would_ find him.

The Talz carrying Baras’ lightsaber shook angrily, so that his thick fur shuddered and bits of snow and ice fell down onto the floor by his feet. He lifted a clawed finger towards her, “See? Sith make no deals! They only know how to destroy, fight! No trust them!”

Lusiel bent an eyebrow up as she looked back at the creature. Xerender should have come here himself, she thought. This only reminded her of his apprentice, the pitiful thing that shook and wailed when Broonmark cut him down. Xerender seemed nearly blind to the risk he asked of the ones who followed him. She opined, “Perhaps you should have asked yourself why the Jedi would send you to these pirates for a blade he knew I was seeking. What does it say, that he sent _you_ into a conflict he should have met himself?”

The Talz growled at her. Lusiel was really starting to dislike the sound of Talzzi. The reedy quality of the speech made the threats the Talz were inclined to give her seem more funny than serious. How could you be frightened of something that seemed to be whistling at you all the time, she thought. She almost wanted to wait for a punch line, or for a Talz to hold up its claws and laugh, "Boo! Just teasing!" Instead, the Talz commando stomped its thick, round foot, “It says Jedi Xerender knows we can kill you!”

At least he managed to convince the pirates by then, Lusiel thought. Because the advozse finally spun around and started shouting for his own pirate followers to _fight_. Quinn knelt down quickly, only leaning up briefly to lob a stun grenade over his head that dropped down into the center of the circling pirates. Poor schlubs were even more shocked and dismayed, as the brilliant flash of light and mind-numbing whistling noise left them tumbling around on the floor insensibly. Quinn jumped up then to run over and start shooting them as they were rolling around and clutching their faces from the panic.

Lusiel didn’t stop long enough to admire the entertaining display.

The Talz were whistling shrilly new and vibrant threats. They each clutched a vibroblade in their rough, long claws and rushed at her all at once. Lusiel lifted her own lightsaber, letting the glow of her blade turn the ice-drenched walls of the cavernous outpost all around them bright scarlet. Like the walls themselves glowed red -- like alarm and threat was come to vivid life and peeled all around them. As the Talz ringed her then, Lusiel lifted up and spun, spun and spun, flying in quick, fast circles with her lightsaber flashing out and around. The Force held her in place, so she moved in terrible threat and the Talz felt her lightsaber biting, ripping into them.

One after another, each one of the Talz felt the slashing bright tearing of Lusiel’s lightsaber into their flesh. Blood flew. Not red like a human’s – Talz blood was thickly blue, rather. It dropped down onto the ground in heavy puddles, spilled from the Talz in great and terrible streams and droplets alike. The creatures fell backwards, so that their whistles turned to trilling shrieks of pain and terror. They lost limbs, they lost their lives – Lusiel took it all from them, and left them to drop down onto the floor in white heaps of sodden fur.

She sank down into a crouch once the attack was finished, standing poised and threateningly fierce in the neat circle of dead Talz as she looked sideways towards her Quinn. He was finishing the advozse, standing over the man with one booted feet pressed down over his neck where he lay flat on his back on the floor. Quinn held his blaster pistol cupped in both his hands as he looked down at the prone figure under him. He leaned his entire weight onto his foot, pressing hard, harder. Until the pirate’s gurgling slowly choked into gasps of panic and his heels beat a rapid rhythm against the floor.

Lusiel glanced quickly, saw that Quinn had already shot the other two pirates. Both of the dead men were lying splayed in sheer X shapes across the floor, their arms and legs stretched into arching lines out from their bodies. Lusiel idly wondered if he had planned them to fall that way. Maybe to keep their blood from spraying against his own clothes; here the blood would likely dry into hard, cracking flakes rather than wash off easily. Hoth was far removed from Quesh, at least.

Then Lusiel sensed new motion through the Force, sensed him coming at her and lifted her lightsaber up into a straight, rigid line of threat that she pointed straight towards Broonmark’s furry neck.

Broonmark was agitated, barely paid attention to the advozse’s last, final death throes. He pointed at the dead Talz, rather, “My clan! Mine to kill, for following Fetzellen! Sith is strong, but I show my own strength. I win my _own_ vengeance!” Lusiel narrowed her eyes at the furry creature, barely shook her lightsaber to and fro as she repeated herself.

Mostly because she remembered the salve she applied to Quinn’s burns along his side the night before. Quinn had hissed in pain as she smoothed the gelatinous medicine across the marks, then teased her by saying he would prepare proper “mental notes” regarding Talz fighting tactics to avoid being caught so off-guard ever again when she frowned angrily down at the wounds. His joking didn’t work, though. When she sighed unhappily, he kissed her. It proved a far more effective strategy in distracting her from being upset. So he kept kissing her.

The pleasure of the memory kept her from outright cutting Broonmark’s throat right then. She only kept her lightsaber held up as she snarled at him, “Your sneaking after me is only annoying me, Talz. I told you to stay out of my way!”

Broonmark warbled at her, “You want to kill the Jedi. I won’t bother your fight with Xerender. Just let me destroy Fetzellen first! He’ll try stopping you, but I will break him for you! Vow! _Yours_!” Lusiel considered him carefully. She slowly lowered her weapon down towards the floor.

“You’ll do as I say. So long as I give you the chance to kill this Fetzellen character?”

“Vow forever!”

Lusiel could almost swear she’d just heard the Talz equivalent of “Boo! Just teasing!”


	69. When the Time Comes, Remember

"My lord! There's a storm rolling in! We must take shelter inside! Now!" Quinn yanked Lusiel back into the lee of the doorway, just as a vicious gust of wind ripped against the side of the mountain and blasted its way past the opening. Quinn pressed Lusiel behind him, sheltering her smaller body with his own until the wind slowed enough for him to pull her back through the doors into the outpost again.

At least Broonmark was gone, Quinn thought. The Talz crept away once he’d secured Lusiel’s tacit agreement to allow for a confrontation between him and his former clan member. And the outpost was shelter enough from the storm Quinn could hear was raging outside now, even if the floors were still littered with broken, shattered corpses. They were quite alone right then.

Quinn secured the doors, firstly. Even if the extreme winds battered the entire ground outside, there was no guarantee someone wouldn’t approach and try to enter. Desperate need for shelter might press them, regardless of risk or threat. So Quinn properly shielded the entrance, setting alarms and fields in place to keep them safe from intruders.

Then he moved to clear a space free of dead pirates and talz, dragging the bodies into one of the nearby rooms leading off from the main space. He set several heaters into a neat circle around a mound that he made of their own sleeping pallets and blankets, reinforcing the climate controls the pirates had set in the outpost already. Working steadily, Quinn rapidly established a comfortable resting area in the midst of the debris. It looked like a cozy, little nest all their own, Lusiel thought, smiling.

Lusiel leaned against a nearby stone wall, her commlink held in one small hand as she described the situation to Lieutenant Pierce. He had managed to find shelter with Jaesa at the Imperial outpost called Frostwake just before the storm hit. She explained, "The good news is we found the weapon Baras sent me here to discover. The bad news is we are now caught at the base where these fool pirates were squatting and surrounded by their bodies as we wait out the storm. Are you secure, there?"

"Yes, my lord. Storm's hitting the outpost hard, too. Spoke to Vette at Dorn; she says the storm hasn't yet grounded troops at that end of the planet. But it's moving fast. Hoth keeps people on their toes, obviously. We'll wait for word from you, my lord," Pierce reported.

Satisfied that her people were safe from the ravages of Hoth's climate, Lusiel returned her attention to her surroundings, eyeing her own Quinn as he went about dusting the splotches of blood still on the floor with some kind of chemical. Hopefully the smell of blood wouldn’t prove over-rank, she thought. She considered him, each bend and twist of his form as he moved, every turn of his head and thoughtful crinkle of his brow.

They’ll call him my base servant, think that I made him mine because of his loyalty and his service, Lusiel thought as she watched him work so fast and methodically. They will not know his nature, the way his mind and temper moved. They will not understand the comfort, the security he finds through the precision of his routines. _And none of them will know how very much I care, can’t know_. _That he is_ mine, she thought.

Quinn turned to her, frowning, "You must remove your wet clothes, my lord." Lusiel glanced down the length of her front, finally noticing the small puddle that was forming under her boots from the snow droplets melting off her armor and robes. She shivered suddenly, felt her nipples peaking into hard numbs from the cold. Quinn reached for her roughly, began yanking against her clothes in a frantic rush to get her warm. Lusiel watched him rather than helped, smiling slightly as she remembered the last time he stripped her.

This time, she wanted Quinn bared naked first.

Lusiel's torso was already nude when she suddenly slapped Quinn's hands away and began pulling his clothes off, rather. Quinn inhaled sharply when Lusiel grabbed the ties of his coat and unfastened them quickly, pushed it off and away from his shoulders. Her breasts bounced, and Quinn found himself mesmerized watching the way both her pink areolas bobbed and her nipples puckered. Lusiel reached down and pulled the hem of his shirt up and then over his head, sliding her cold hands all along his sides so that he shivered.

Then she suddenly stepped forward, wrapping her arms around him and rubbing her breasts against his chest as she tucked her head into the bend of his shoulder. Quinn groaned, holding her close and sharing his own vigor with her. So that she warmed, gentled against him and rested. He sighed huskily, "Your pants and boots, my lord."

"No. You first. I want you to feel me, to know I’ll give you _everything_." Because everyone would know her power and place. But _she_ would always recognize Quinn’s value was just as much, just as real.

Lusiel reached down, lowered herself to her knees in front of him. He helped her, letting his pants slide down his thighs before kicking his boots off his feet. Together they pulled off the very last of his clothes and then Lusiel looked up his entire length, her dark eyes shining as she enjoyed the sight of Quinn fully naked. "Delicious," she murmured. “Will you let me taste you?”

He canted his head, “You would _ask_ me?” He shivered when Lusiel leaned forward, touched the very crown of his hardening erection with a soft lick. He held his breath when she ran her tongue down his length, tickling the underside as she went. And he groaned loudly when she finally opened her mouth wide and engulfed all of him inside her mouth. He reached up to hold her head in place, gently rocked his hips against her face. Quinn's head fell back as he moaned her name, "Lusiel. Damn. Like that, yes. Gods."

Lusiel listened to him, moaned around the flesh in her mouth. He bucked his hips when he felt the vibration against him. So she did it again. Quinn began a smooth thrusting motion against her, reaching for the back of her throat as Lusiel relaxed into the experience. She ran her hands along the backs of his thighs, scratched her nails along the sensitive skin of his backside and finally pulled him harder against her face in rhyme with his movements.

"Enough!" Quinn stopped moving suddenly, snatched himself from her mouth. Lusiel thrilled as he took control, looking up at him. Wanted it, wanted him to show her how strong he was, how forceful he could be.

Quinn reached down and picked her up, striding over to the pallet he'd tossed onto the floor near the heaters. He set her on her feet and stripped her remaining clothes off, tossing them aside carelessly. Lusiel watched her undergarments float to the ground in a little bundle, thinking how unlike Quinn it was not to fold them up first.

Then he spun her around, pushing her forward onto her hands and knees. Lusiel felt him settling behind her on his knees, hurriedly positioned her in front of him. She lowered her head down, clutching the edges of the pallet as she thrust her buttocks upwards, spreading her thighs. She heard Quinn groan again. Lusiel moaned loudly as she felt him start to enter her, one of his hands holding her around the waist as he pressed himself inside.

"You make me lose my senses," Quinn grumbled, moving to grip both her hips firmly.

"Take what you want, Malavai."

He began thrusting into her, pushing himself as deeply as he could go. He yanked her hips back and into his thrusts to increase the force of his penetration, and Lusiel keened. She felt him stretching her, plunging, riding her hard. She called out his name, yelled, "Malavai!" And the pleasure whipped at her, burst upon her rawest senses.

She wailed his name again, tossing her head back and arching her back. She felt him clutch her, heard him groan when he felt her inner muscles grip and squeeze him through her orgasm. He thrust once, then twice. Held himself there as he found his own satisfaction, felt it rippling through him. He fell forward, only barely caught himself before he crushed her beneath him. He wrapped one arm around her so that he held her close to him, curved himself around her entire back before falling sideways so they curled together on the pallet, warm and sated.

Lusiel glanced down where Quinn’s hand was splayed over her belly. She smiled drowsily as she reached down to press his hand harder against her warm abdomen, "We should probably get married pretty soon, hmm?" Quinn looked down at their hands wrapped together like that, pulled her tighter towards him. His eyes flared as he thought of her like that, of what it would be to curl his hand over her belly swollen with his own child.

Lusiel wondered aloud, "You hadn't even thought of that, did you?"

"I _have_ thought of it, actually. But it was like a dream to me; I'd barely imagined you saying yes, rather."

"Why?"

Quinn shrugged, rubbing his nose against the tender skin along the back of her neck. He was still shaking from the strength of his passion for the woman he held, felt terrified he would lose her. So many powers moved against them.

"This has to do with your father, doesn't it?" Lusiel considered.

He hesitated. "Rymar Quinn never let me forget that I wasn’t connected to the Force, that I wasn’t called to it. I was his greatest disappointment and nothing I ever did could make up for it, according to him." Quinn brushed his fingers against her belly again, imagined how Lusiel might care for his own children. He sank down into that sheer _wanting_ , afraid.

"Your father was a fool, Malavai. _I_ am not." Lusiel leaned up onto an elbow. She sensed his pain and his fear, and her brow crinkled as she leaned closer, reached up to run the fingers of one hand in a drifting motion across his temple and along the top edge of his ear. "There will be plenty of rumors, questions regarding why I'll marry you. They won’t understand the truth, though. I'll only tell them of your brilliance, your nerve. I'll tell them what the Force whispered to me, that the children you make for me will be powerful and Force strong and so very much like _you_ ; all of them, Malavai. And even then only some will ever realize there's more to it, because that's really all they need to know."

He wondered about the Force’s working in her, what it told her. Did it really speak? Was it visions that she experienced? Words? "Because it’s important they don’t know."

She tapped his ear, nuzzled his chin with her nose and finally rested her head into the curve of his throat. "If they know I love you so much, they’ll try to take you away from me. They’ll hurt you. I can’t let that happen. It’s easier if they fool themselves into thinking it’s only power I want from you, that I’m only using you."

Quinn nodded. "I understand." And he did. He knew Sith politics could be brutally simple at times. Love and its passions could strengthen a Sith and simultaneously become a bludgeon against them. Most Sith eschewed love matches entirely, especially the most powerful Sith.

Lusiel would be _very_ powerful by the time she was done, Quinn thought. He tightened his arms around her, listened to her breathing under the crook of his head. He couldn’t be a tool to harm her, thought of Baras and the way he used people. What could he do to protect the woman that he loved?

“You’re not alone, Malavai,” Lusiel whispered slowly. She was nearly asleep. But the Force moved in her, gently compelling her to remember. She remembered her own father just then, “Neither of us ever fights alone. Remember that, when the times comes.”


	70. Buried in the Ice

Quinn’s catalogued notes were precise, as Lusiel leaned sideways against his elbow to consider them. He squirmed, uncomfortably aware of Lusiel’s perusal of his datapad and fighting the urge to lift the datapad’s surface away from her line of sight. He concentrated on the brush of loose tendrils of dark hair against Lusiel’s brow instead, the way she brusquely pushed them back from falling forward.

Lusiel murmured, “Prepare a section of the hold suitable for a Talz’ size and acclimation needs, adjust temperature controls throughout the ship … I suppose that means I’d have to obtain thicker tunics for loungewear.” She glanced up at him then, smiling slightly, “Waste disposal units would need adjusting. Truly, Quinn?”

Quinn’s brow twisted into a sharp frown, “Have you seen the amount of waste they shovel away from Talz settlements? It’s obscene.”

Lusiel shrugged, biting her lip deliberately. “No, I haven’t made it a point to examine the size and weight of anyone’s excrement recently.” Quinn finally jerked his datapad from Lusiel’s purview, dropping it into the pack that hung against his side as she returned to considering the confrontation happening between the two Talz in front of them. He lifted his chin, “Have you done so in the past, then?”

“Of course. Sometimes an enemy loses control of his system as he perishes, and I can’t help it.”

Quinn watched as Broonmark swung an exceedingly large vibroblade over his head, causing Fetzellen to stumble backwards and actually chirp a panicked cry. But he wasn’t fast enough, and Broonmark’s slash neatly severed Fetzellen’s leg at mid-calf. Fetzellen started to fall, as Quinn mumbled, “Do you think this Fetzellen will soil himself before Broonmark finishes him?”

Lusiel watched, as Broonmark stalked across the space in the brief interior of the wrecked vessel until he loomed over Fetzellen. Fetzellen lifted a supplicating hand towards Broonmark as he lay there on the floor, clutching the stump of his leg in a growing pool of blue blood. “I do believe it’s a certainty, Quinn. Broonmark is nearly frightening _me_ as I stand here watching.”

Broonmark cried out a triumphant shout as he lifted his vibroblade over his head with both clawed hands. Quinn lifted one shoulder as he considered, “You did say you wanted a brute on the crew, my lord.”

“I thought that was supposed to be Pierce, in fact.”

"I will be _certain_ to remind him of his appropriate role according to you, my lord."

Broonmark brought his vibroblade down, down in a terrible arching swing as he roared, and Fetzellen screamed one last time. The blade split Fetzellen’s forehead into a neat furrow, causing blue blood to fly through the air in a thick, blunt burst.

Quinn turned to Lusiel with a single eyebrow lifted up tellingly. Lusiel sighed, “I concede your point, Quinn. Make adjustments to the waste disposal units on board the Wing accordingly.”

* * *

 

_The battle raged for days high above the planet's surface._

_The Republic had amassed a huge armada of ships, many of them using never before seen technologies, all powerful and terrible in scope. The Star of Coruscant alone bristled with countless experimental weapons, a superdreadnought that its builder, Colonel Omas, swore would be the spearhead that took the head of the Emperor himself. The fleet was destined to confront the Sith at Dromund Kaas -- a mighty blow that would work to bring the Great Galactic War to an end and spell a final death knell to the Sith Empire._

_Instead, a single Imperial agent discovered the existence of the fleet. What's worse, he learned what route the fleet was taking to reach Dromund Kaas. And just as the Republic ships traversed the Hoth system they were confronted by an Imperial Armada at least equal in size to their own, if not scope._

_Devastated ships became wrecks that rained down upon the surface of Hoth. Some broke into pieces. The Vehement Sword's prototype null cannons were ripped apart in Hoth's atmosphere, falling in lumps of debris in long swaths across the planet's surface. But the Star of Coruscant crashed into Hoth remarkably intact._

_Years later, Jedi Knight Leeha Narezz called Hoth "the largest starship graveyard in the galaxy", echoing the sentiments of countless pirates, criminals and scavengers that looted among the debris. They hunted for treasures and powers, trinkets that would elevate them towards wealth and luxury enough to finally leave Hoth._

_But none of them discovered the Jedi Master who lay in a trance far beneath the ice and snow, ripped from the sky when the Imperial prison ship transporting him to Dromund Kaas and Darth Baras was destroyed in the battle. He lay there communing with the Force; it sustained him and his strength even as the years slipped into decades. Until he could finally call out to his padawan._

_Eventually, Xerender heard him and he came. But the Force seeks constant balance. And Xerender wasn’t the only one who listened to the call and followed._

* * *

 

Wyelett tried to know her, to see her through the Force. He had sensed her coming, just as much as he’d felt Xerender approaching. Like the two of them were somehow connected, like this meeting was a concurrence, something fated and anticipated. Wyelett thought maybe he could reach her, the way he hadn’t managed to reach Baras years before. And then she was facing him, her eyes shining almost black against the backdrop of snow and ice all around them and he knew that Lusiel was far more some part of the Force’s deepest rage and anger than Baras ever was.

She stepped unerringly through the slush of melted snow and brittle ice, the dregs left behind by Xerender’s determined push through the wreckage of the crashed Imperial ship to reach him. She’d pulled the cover off from her head, letting her hair drag limply against the back of her neck so that she could see him without the lens of a faceplate blocking her vision and her hair looked as black as space against all the white ice of the walls. Then she murmured curiously, “If you want to see me so badly, why not only ask? I’ll gladly introduce myself.”

“Because Master Wyelett is weary,” Xerender interjected abruptly. He addressed Lusiel strongly, with utter determination lining his muscled frame as he stepped around his ailing master to confront her. He glanced behind her, where Quinn was waving Broonmark back from the aggression he wanted to give them. Xerender sounded sad as he watched them, “You destroyed the Talz outside. Don’t you realize why they turned from Broonmark, shunned him? He’s a maddened monster, prone to the basest violence – he enjoys causing damage and pain.”

Lusiel smirked a glance over her shoulder at the Imperial officer who followed her, “A real brute, then. We’ve been looking for one.”

Xerender shuddered with the lightest tendrils of disgust, “Like any other Sith. You delight in hostility and cruelty.”

Then Wyelett lifted one of his hands, waved his former padawan back. He cared for Xerender, felt pride in his accomplishments. Xerender had exceeded every one of Wyelett’s expectations of him and his abilities, was a Knight of their Order wholly, fully. But he still didn’t see. Wyelett waved towards Xerender, but he still watched Lusiel sadly, “No, Xerender. She relies on anger, on rage, rather – it drives her, fuels the power of the Force inside of her.”

Xerender blinked, “Such things lead to the worst of malicious brutalities, towards the very depths of the Dark Side itself.”

“Which is why we turn from it, yes.” Wyelett lifted his shoulder, carefully gauging his returning strength, “But do not fool yourself. Fury and vehemence are just as much a part of the Force. Ferocity can drive us as hard as any serenity might soothe and comfort us.”

Xerender struggled to understand. Wyelett saw him, his face scrunched into a deeply thoughtful frown as he regarded the Sith with careful precision. “It’s …” And then Lusiel chuckled derisively.

“Only say the word bad. Or maybe wrong, scary, terrible – call it _evil_! Like a bogeyman hiding under a child’s bed.” She circled around them, pushing the snow from in front of her with simple waves of her booted feet and barely looking towards where Quinn was preparing a grenade. As if she’d ever lose sight of the Republic men who’d followed Xerender into the wrecked ship, either. She canted to the side again, “How simply your mind moves, Xerender. You tried to convince Baras he could be a Jedi, too. And how did that work, in the end?”

Xerender clenched his fingers tightly around the hilt of his lightsaber, “It allowed my master, Wyelett, to carry Baras’ blade as his own for years. Testimony of the real ‘power’ of the dark side.” But Wyelett murmured his name warningly, “Xerender … don’t.”

Lusiel smirked at the younger Jedi, “You see, Xerender? You fail as easily as any Jedi. Because you don’t understand, that it isn’t _feeling_ anger that leads you anywhere. It’s only when you let go of your own control of it that you’re lost.” She lifted her lightsaber up straight, until it shined brilliantly in an even, red line across the pale smoothness of her own face, “ _I_ am not lost.” Then she leaped towards Xerender, propelling herself through the Force with singular will and determination.

Quinn’s stun grenade flew over Lusiel’s head at the same time, landing with a sodden thud on the floor next to the Republic captain who was shouting at his tiny squad. The thing burst in a shower of flashing light and stunning sound. Quinn went down onto a knee, preparing to fire at the dazed soldiers stumbling in measly circles. But then Broonmark sailed towards them, stomping across the snow-covered floor in a huge flurry of white violence. The Talz looked like a pale, ghostly Reek beast, charging at its prey across an icy field. Broonmark thundered headfirst into the gut of the Republic captain, lifting the human up into the air with the force of his headbutting blow and sending him flying backwards into a wall hard enough his head actually made a booming sound as it impacted. Quinn actually winced as he watched the Talz methodically stomp every one of the soldiers.

But Lusiel landed nimbly next to Xerender, reached out to push against him using the Force. The Jedi knight flew across the brief, ice-covered space they had carved through to where Wyelett was huddled deep in trance with the Force. Now Wyelett shouted as he stumbled from the brief strength in his legs and grabbed onto a nearby rock before he fell, “Xer! Defend yourself!” But Xerender depended too much on his physical strength.

He couldn’t manage to outmaneuver Lusiel, could only barely rise up in time to meet her when she flew at him again and again. His superior size became a liability, as Lusiel flowed around him like water over and around a stone in the middle of a river. Her lightsaber met Xerender’s blows simply, smoothly screeching its tune against its surface, and she retaliated every time with sinuous and graceful strikes back at him. They were whipping fast strikes, her red saber flashing down over Xerender’s thighs, his ankles and causing him to jump and skitter away from her, then up towards his stomach so that he only barely leaned back from her reach, too. Finally, Lusiel bent under Xerender’s swing, weaving downwards to tuck her chin against her own collarbone while her dark eyes closed gently – and her lightsaber slashed almost slowly up with brutal, biting force into Xerender’s side.

Xerender yelled a pained cry as he tumbled down onto all fours, his lightsaber clattering to the floor. Lusiel reached out to roughly grab the hair at the top of his head and yank his face up towards her own gaze, sneering down at him, “Anger and hate don’t _compel_ me, they don’t make me. But you stumble.”

Lusiel lifted her lightsaber, held it straight across Xerender’s thick neck. And then Wyelett moaned, shouting, “No, Sith! Don’t!” Lusiel twisted her head sideways to look over towards the ailing Jedi, watched disinterestedly as he waved his hand weakly at her through the air. “Please,” he said. Lusiel frowned at him, her lips tightening into a thin line just before her arm moved. The glow of her lightsaber was so bright, so vivid that the blood was at first obscured by the scarlet color of her own blade. But Xerender gurgled loudly around the violence of blood gushing from his ripped throat. Then Lusiel let go of Xerender’s hair and waited as he slowly collapsed down, down until he lay splayed flat on his face there on the floor.

Wyelett wilted against the rock that still held him up, looking down at Xerender’s shattered form for a long, long moment. “Why?” Then he looked up, watching as Lusiel stalked towards him. Behind her, Broonmark was lifting one pawed foot to smash down over the face of the last Republic man still alive. Wyelett shook his head, tired, abreft and defeated for perhaps the first time that he could remember. Not even when the transport carrying him to Dromund Kaas plummeted down towards the surface of Hoth instead, not when it smashed into the planet’s surface and leave him buried under the weight and press of icy decades – not even then did Wyelett ever feel so beaten.

Lusiel stopped in front of him, staring down at the top of his bent head. His hair was thick and long against the back of his neck, damp from the wet snow that had covered him for so long, and very white, nearly the color of the snow all around them. She held her lightsaber out to her side, so that the blade extended in a scarlet line straight sideways from her body, and she told him, “Even if Baras allowed for it. Even if the Empire forgot you in this place and left you buried. Even if every one of my most important people didn’t have to pay the price if I did so much to hide you. The truth is, Wyelett, that I’m already going to fight and destroy Baras eventually, and I won’t let you use the power I sense recovering in you now against me. Not ever.”

Master Wyelett sighed deeply, just one more time before Lusiel finished it.


	71. To Become Married

_"That day Kaas City was beautiful, my darling. It wasn't raining. There was even a lightening to the sky. My family was so proud of me. I was wedding a true hero, a man who'd fought and saved so many lives across countless battlefields. He would be an admiral, even a Moff, my mother said to me. But my father told me, that his brother was a powerful Sith. That blood would bring our own family line into the highest levels of power and influence, he said. At last."_

Jaesa studied her master, as Lusiel stood in front of the Vaiken Spacedock’s windows in obvious contemplation. She thought the Sith Lord might be meditating. But then Lusiel smoothed her hand down over the folds of her burgundy-colored robes covering her armor, which was polished to a blackened sheen. Lusiel picked at seemingly invisible lint along the cuff of one sleeve and then returned to considering the windows.

She looked … pensive. Far removed from the typical dominance and strength that normally shaped her features. Jaesa wondered what she was thinking of right then.

Outside, scores of Imperial ships dotted the view, all reflecting the brilliant light of the nearby star and the dark, sultry shine of Dromund Kaas, below. The room set apart from the finer sections of the Spacedock was richly appointed, with thick rugs emblazoned with the Empire’s symbols and comfortable seating arranged in a circle around a looming table carved from what could only be real mahogany-colored wood. Jaesa stepped closer to Lusiel, murmured, “Master?"

Lusiel raised an eyebrow as she turned to face Jaesa, but she didn’t smile. Jaesa was gripped the folds of her formal crimson robes, roughly enough they rustled loudly in the fine silence of the room. Not even Vette’s bouncing excitement as she leaned against a nearby wall disrupted the quiet stillness of the moment.

"This isn't wise, master," Jaesa frowned at Lusiel, chewing on her lower lip as she dropped her eyes down at the floor. The entire event confused her, in fact. There simply was no reason for it; why would Lusiel do such a thing when she already had the man? She could use him as often as she desired, then set him aside simply enough after she tired of him. Why make such a claim, such a bold proclamation of her intention to _keep_ him? That’s when Lusiel smiled, “At least you’re bold enough to ask, apprentice.”

Jaesa frowned, her senses flowing without real consideration or intention to better understand. Lusiel waited, her head leaned sideways as Jaesa concentrated her ability and wondered if her own barriers would prove strong enough to resist Jaesa’s unique power. But then Jaesa’s eyes widened, flaring with awed shock. And Lusiel knew she would have to find new ways to hide her mind from her apprentice.

“Master? Is such a thing even possible?” Jaesa stumbled backwards a step, her mouth screwed into curious wonder. Although why not? The Sith could feel just as much, just as powerfully as any being, nor did they deny them. They gave their feelings far more latitude than any Jedi allowed, even. “Doesn’t such a thing weaken you?”

“No. Passion fills us with even more intense power, rather. It livens us, stirs us at every turn,” Lusiel slowly rolled her shoulders. Her hair was coiled against the back of her head, carefully coifed, darkly beautiful like Lusiel was all the time. Jaesa shifted uncomfortably.

“But losing it would …”

“I will _not_ lose him.” Lusiel turned around to consider the expanse outside the windows again, her face stonely intense again. Jaesa knew she was back to pondering Jaesa’s ability to betray her, and she sighed unhappily.

It didn’t seem to matter how adamantly she promised Lusiel, that she wouldn’t act as so many apprentices did. Jaesa wasn’t interested in supplanting her master in the ages-old Sith tradition of dominance and control, and maybe that’s where Jaesa was finally so much failed as a Sith. She had supposed it was an unwise clinging to her own Jedi roots, where padawans were cared for by their masters and relationships were more akin to a parent and child than master and servant. Her own parents had barely cared for her, after all; they regarded her more as a commodity worth bartering towards their own betterment, rather.

No, Jaesa ached longingly for something greater. More real.

But Lusiel had no Jedi teaching, no Republic tradition of autonomy and mutual respect that she could draw upon. She examined everything and everyone for the chance they would strike at her, try to drag her down and destroy her.

At least Lusiel tolerated Jaesa’s idiosyncrasies in this regard. Probably because it won them a sort of security in the meantime.

Perhaps there would come a time when things were different. Maybe Jaesa would change and she would lose these final vestiges of her own experience and learning as an Alderaanian and a Jedi, both. Maybe she would be a real Sith and she would finally try to destroy her own master and teacher. Perhaps. But today, Jaesa doubted it would happen. Even if she did not _like_ Lusiel, she believed she would never be truly capable of defeating her. Lusiel's was an indelible strength, one that would only grow and broaden Lusiel advanced. And she would advance; Lusiel was still only barely older than Jaesa herself.

"Still. This is dangerous among the Sith, isn’t it?"

Lusiel grinned, then, "That's what makes it fun."

Vette laughed aloud, practically jumping off from her leaning position to bound across the room towards them, "Never a dull moment where you're concerned, my lord. But he's still Mr. Stick-up-his-butt to me."

That's when the doors opened and the men started filing inside.

_"Your father wore his uniform that day. He looked so handsome, so dark. His eyes were deep pools of dark brown. It was like looking at the rich soil of Dromund Kaas after a rainfall late at night, his gaze. He had so many medals adorning his uniform, the insignia of his unit was like the brightest blood red, and his boots gleamed black. I was so proud I could call him mine."_

Lieutenant Pierce marched into the room just behind the captain, pausing only to adjust the hard edge of his new armored uniform first. Lord Lusiel had seen to it his uniform reflected the honor of his current assignment, and it gleamed blackly in the light cast by the planet below through the nearby windows. Scarlet insignia depicting his special forces training and experience stained the arms of his chestpiece.

Pierce took up a guard stance just inside of the doorway, even as he watched the proceedings. The captain, though, continued forward. Quinn's officer's uniform was the standard gray of the Imperial military. Black epaulettes encased his shoulders and a black cord looped over his right shoulder, extending under his arm, the black designating his role as an officer in direct service to a Sith while the cord specified the Sith he served was at least the rank of Lord.

Pierce wondered why Lord Lusiel was doing this, actually. Not that he'd make a point of asking her, either. Vette had been right about that much, at least. One simply didn't question a Sith's judgement. Not and keep his head in one piece and right there on top of his neck, anyway. Hey, when a person can throw you into a nearby wall hard enough your spine snapped, it was just plain best to keep from riling them.

No, it was far safer to sit back and mull the question, rather than come right out and ask. So what if the effort left him just bewildered. Like he was right after Quesh, when Quinn took to moving all his private things into Lord Lusiel's quarters. Why she'd go so far as to move the man into her own personal space was just mind-blowing, to Pierce’s way of thinking. Now there was this whole marriage business, to boot. It tossed his ever-lasting mind, it really did.

Oh, Quinn's reasoning made perfect sense. Quinn would make out quite handily in this little venture, after all. He certainly had example enough to know it could be done. Hey, like father, like son.

Rymar Quinn had married a Sith, too. Probably for the same damn reason, too. What would faster propel an officer's career than marriage to a Sith? Based on everything Pierce learned, it worked out pretty well for Rymar. That man climbed rapidly into the highest ranks, was a Colonel when he ended up pretty dead during an attack by fringe pirates on the ship where he was serving. Apparently the bugger actually defended the ship well enough, leading from the front no less, and keeping the pirates from every entering the bridge until the crew managed a counter-assault that obliterated the pirate vessel. Yea, Rymar Quinn would probably have managed some exceptional service or another that netted him even more promotions if he hadn’t become so dead.

That, and his Sith wife died giving birth to a son with no force sensitivity of his own.

Rymar apparently encouraged his son to follow in his footsteps, though, because Malavai Quinn spent the entirety of his education in the most advanced – and expensive - military academies in the Empire. Pierce didn't have much respect for a book-learned officer. Education born of experience, that came from the battlefield, either in direct combat or in immediate leadership, would have been training Pierce could nod off on.

Instead, he was stuck with Quinn. Who's real talent seem to lie more in earning the admiration of their gorgeous as hells Sith Lord, enough she'd marry the prissy twat. Fuck! The man was going to rise to the rank of Moff, Pierce fumed.

Some men just have all the luck, he thought, watching Quinn step forward to take Lusiel's hand.

_"Some of my sweetest friends were in attendance. They came from the best families in Kaas City, of course. They all told me how beautiful I looked, as I came into the room wearing this gorgeous lavender dress made of silk from Corellia. But I had so many gifts, too, from every planet of the galaxy. I felt as if I was the most important girl who ever lived."_

Broonmark didn't know what to make of the gathering. He let the little blue female prepare him for the event, though. She carefully brushed his fur out, even, and twittered the entire time like a tiny and exotic bird. Broonmark had quite enjoyed the exchange, in fact.

Still, he was confused as he followed the other males into the room and perched himself near the tiny twi'lek female. He knew the Sith mated the dark-haired human male often. Their bond was strong and certainly required no public acknowledgement. Didn’t the other humans already smell how strongly the pair marked each other? Maybe they were as blind in their noses as their eyes, Broonmark pondered.

If the Sith were Talz, she would have entered the male's living space and made it her own. That would have been enough of a declaration. The tribe would have recognized their bond after that, no one would have questioned it. Of course the Sith was stronger than her chosen mate, so he slept in her quarters on the ship. Why wasn't that enough? The way these humans acted, though, the mate bond was only real after they'd pronounced it publicly in this ritualistic manner.

It was all very strange.

Broonmark wondered if some males would try to take the Sith from her mate, otherwise. Perhaps they gathered together so the male could face his challengers directly. A fight would at least be entertaining, Broonmark thought. Or maybe the Sith would kill them, here. She was more than capable of such a feat. Broonmark only wounded her mate and she threw him down onto the ground, then stomped on his chest. The Sith could wreak terrible havoc on anyone who tried taking her mate from her own possession, he knew it!

Then an older human male came inside the room, and Broonmark watched him to see if he would offer a challenge. But the Sith remained unconcerned. She didn’t even look at the man, only watched the objects he laid down onto the table there in the center of the room. A silken cord and what looked to be two metallic ornamental objects, apparently. Broonmark was the only one who judged the human as a potential rival, it seemed. The male was dressed in uniformed coverings similar to the Sith’s mate, although there were more decorations on his front side. Then the Sith and her mate approached him, stood side by side there in front of him.

Broonmark shook his head. Humans were as weird as they were ugly.

_"I felt like the whole world was mine, if only I reached out to grab it. Everyone wanted it for me, my parents and all of my friends. Surely he did too, and he would secure it for my having. He would introduce me to admirals and moffs, their families. Maybe I would even rub elbows with Sith,_ powerful _Sith. I could have the entire Empire if I wanted, I just knew it."_

Vette watched as Lusiel and Quinn stood in front of the official registrant appointed to record their marriage. She suddenly remembered the first time she'd seen Quinn, way back on Balmorra. The smell of the bombs going off, the whistling sound of aircraft overhead – all of it seemed so far away now, like a whole ‘nother life even.

She wasn’t as flat-out blind as apprentice-type Jaesa, at least. She knew good and well why they were doing this. But that’s cause she watched them back there on Balmorra. Not like Jaesa or Pierce, who fumbled around begging for reasons why Lusiel was marrying the captain.

Vette had seen them, back when she was still trying to figure Lusiel out. And watching people was a pretty big deal. A skill, even. Slaves who didn’t pay attention to the nuances of behavior in those more powerful than they were ended up paying nasty-assed consequences.

So she’d seen Lusiel look at Quinn and seen him look back, all dazed and wanting looking at each other. They _liked_ each other right from the start, and then they had time and space that the wanting grew and thrived into more. She kind of thought Lusiel’s fat master wanted it, that he made Quinn come along with them after Balmorra. Maybe he thought he could control Lusiel using her feelings for the stick-up-his-butt Imperial.

Vette actually thought Baras was the stupid one, though. Lusiel was going to eventually stick that pretty light stick of hers into his big, stupid belly.

The Imperial officer who would register the marriage squared his shoulders, then. His uniform crinkled, all stiffly pressed the way it was. But he nodded at them, unsmiling, "Declare yourselves."

"I'm Sith Lord Lusiel Phyre."

"I'm Captain Malavai Quinn."

The officer grunted. He reached down and picked up the silken cord lying against the edge of the wooden table. He reached over and began twining the cord around the shared grasp of Lusiel and Quinn's hands, not stopping until they were bound together.

"The commitment of marriage is binding. It has to be. The Empire is strengthened or weakened on the success or failure of its most basic bonds, those of family, of partners. To fail in this commitment is to fail the Empire. You will cleave to one another. You will forsake all others. You will produce children that you will raise up to be worthy members of the Empire. You will do this together. Are you agreed?"

Lusiel lifted her chin. "Yes, I will."

Quinn looked at Lusiel, "Yes."

"Are your witnesses present? Declare yourselves." Vette watched as each person in the room spoke their names and rank into the registered recording. When it was her turn, she twitched and grinned wide as a loon, "I'm Vette Ce'na, honorable slave to Sith Lord Lusiel, gratefully." She bowed dramatically, mostly to hide how her eyes gleamed with humor and amusement. Quinn shook his head at her. Then Toovee sounded off, only to say he was recording the proceedings as directed by his master.

Vette pressed closer, then. The ornamental arm cuffs the couple had chosen to signify their marriage were blackened metallic that shimmered translucent in the light when they were left uncovered. Vette watched Lusiel and Quinn place the armlets into place on each other, heard the click as each one snapped closed, and she sighed.

"It's done. You're married." The officer's last words intoned loudly.

Vette waited until the fellow left the room. She looked around, listened to Broonmark make a small warbling sound. "So, uh, hey. Can we hit the VIP lounge now?"

_"Remember, Lusiel. Choose your partner wisely. Make sure he can carry you farther than you would be able to go alone. Do not settle. Do not take a lesser man for your husband. And whatever you do. Don't ever marry for something as absurd as love."_

Lusiel remembered her mother's screams as she plummeted from the windows of her childhood home. She only reclined back against the cushions of her bed. She watched her husband, her own Quinn – he faced her and tugged his uniform off so that he was naked. Lusiel smiled as she raised herself up onto all fours and beckoned to him.

Ah, mother, she thought to herself. I'll do whatever it takes to never, ever be like you.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I did my best to figure out what weddings in the Empire would look like. Other than Anakin's secretive ceremony as depicted in Episode 2, which was more Republic than Imperial, actually, I really had nothing to go on. So I completely made one up. However, I did manage to find a post made by Daniel Erikson where he described the attitude of the Empire towards marriage during this period. I relied heavily on that post as I tried to really "figure out" the SW's marriage to Quinn.
> 
> Daniel Erikson said:
> 
> "For the last thousand years the Sith Empire has needed stability and growth more than anything else. That means alliances that prevent power struggles. It means encouraging the creation of more children. Which in turn means marriage and a focus on family."
> 
> "Where once the individual was judged largely alone, bloodlines are now incredibly socially important. A Sith from a long line of powerful Sith will find his path through the Academy easier, his opportunities increased. A family with no Force-users who suddenly find themselves with a Force-sensitive child will sacrifice everything they have to get them martial training and mental discipline coaches - for if that child passes the Academy and becomes Sith the entire family will rocket to the penultimate social class in Imperial society, side by side with moffs and governors, second only to Sith themselves."
> 
> "Marriage among the Sith is usually between only two people and is often to forge a political alliance. Marriages of love do happen often among the lower ranked Sith but decrease the closer the Lord is to the top of the pyramid-shaped power structure. Marriages between Sith and non-Sith are rare as the Sith believe it dilutes the chance of a Force-sensitive offspring. It is a common, though unspoken of practice, for Sith parents to kill a non Force-sensitive offspring and deny it ever existed, claiming the baby was stillborn, etc. A Sith with openly non Force-sensitive offspring is believed to be admitting the thinness of the blood in his or her family line."
> 
> "Adultery is common among the Sith but officially illegal. Divorce is strongly frowned upon but killing one's spouse for adultery or any other provable offense is socially acceptable. The one time you see obligatory divorce is when a member of the Dark Council breaks a couple apart to stop the assimilation of too much power in one place"


	72. Spinning in his Webs

Darth Baras had devoted precious years – decades even! – all to reach this pinnacle moment. He was so close, so very close now!

And now … NOW! Vengean had discovered Lord Draahg. Of course it would be now, when so much was coming to fruition, when all his players were subtly and carefully maneuvered into position. When Vengean’s position on the Council was finally vulnerable, as the ships of his own fleet rained down over Quesh and the Lords mumbled for Vengean’s own head on a platter. _Now_ Vengean found Draahg. Damn Vengean to the Void and all its most hellish torments!

Baras though he should likely despise Draahg for this singular failure, the ignominy of his capture and torture, and the likely chance he would break down under its pressure to tell Vengean of all Baras’ most careful maneuvers. But Draahg had accomplished much before he was discovered. His loyalty was based foremost on his own betterment and pleasures, and all of it was tied to the success of Baras’ scheming, of course. His own greed and ambition pressed him forward, until he had infiltrated the very most inner sanctum of Vengean’s personal chambers. No, Baras wouldn’t seek Draahg’s destruction any time soon. Nor could he allow Draahg to wither under Vengean’s … consideration of him.

So Baras would release his masterpiece at last. The culmination of every one of his expectations of her since she stepped through the doors of his chambers on Korriban clutching that severed hand of the idiot Tremel. Lusiel was the best of his pieces on the game board; like an explosive device, that placed in just the right place and time wreaked the most exceptional havoc. To change the game entirely, in fact. It’s what he’d intended when he seized her, claimed her as his own apprentice.

Lusiel did not fail, no matter what challenge he demanded of her.

She was beautiful, deadly, and utterly tenacious.

And she was dangerous. To him, as much as to any opponent he used her against.

Lusiel was not so much owned, as she was manipulated with the most careful dolling of information. And even then he wasn’t certain what advantages she maintained in the game they played. No, every brilliant gleam in her eyes promised Baras’ own destruction, and he simply could not allow her the chance. Draahg might be controlled, because Baras knew the means. But Lusiel? She was his own death walking. Like a written promise, even.

Although Baras would never admit it … she _frightened_ him.

No, once Lusiel served her purpose, once her lightsaber took Vengean down, her usefulness to him would finally be finished. The beginning of the end had come.

* * *

Draahg felt his breath catch the first time he caught sight of her. Not that breathing was very easy for him right then. The bands of the torture table were still cutting into his arms and legs with painful force.

But he still felt a thrill when he caught sight of Baras' enforcer. Baras' description did her no justice. He had said once that Lord Lusiel was "attractive enough but dangerously powerful". But when Draahg turned his head to regard the woman who leaned over the table where he was tied, he could not help the whipcord response of his own desire. He thought "attractive enough" was pitifully inadequate; he would use Lusiel in a heartbeat’s moment, rather.

Her eyes alone could win a man's attention. Lusiel cast her gaze down his length, examining the strictures holding him in place. Those eyes tempted with warm, dark appeal, Draahg thought. And her curves? Perfection. Her hips were encased in a roped belt but surely sweet enough to wrap his hands around, while her breasts actually rounded the robed breastplate she sported. Draahg felt himself twitch into hardness. Incredible, considering his own damaged state after Vengean's minions worked him over.

_Don't underestimate her_ , Baras warned him. But the only thing Draahg really wanted to do right then was know her, touch her. Have her.

"Quinn, loose these trusses, first," Lusiel turned her head, addressing an Imperial officer behind her. The man was as dark-haired as she was, garbed in neat, leathered armor that marked him an officer in the service of a Sith Lord. He quickly, ably worked the controls of the device powering Draahg’s manacles, murmuring quietly to avoid gaining notice, "It will only take a moment, my lord."

"You’re Draahg? Baras sent me to retrieve you," Lusiel leaned over him again, frowning. "He provided a resuscitation stimulant, as well." Quinn bent to nimbly administer an injection against his side, and Draahg felt the wash of the medicine as it moved through every course of his body. Draahg thrilled from the drug, the way he did every time. He knew it for the gift it was, that it made him a looming power to be reckoned with and feared.

It gave him the strength to rise up from his torture bed, then. Draahg stood to his full height, and he was able to look down over Lusiel’s small form. He frowned at her, his gaze sliding down over her slim body with its precious feminine curvature. The Imperial was bigger than she was, even – that was obvious enough when the officer stepped closer to her and leaned over to whisper into her ear, almost brushing against her side where her breasts were plumpest. Draahg shifted impatiently from foot to foot, enjoying the pulse of drugs through his system.

Quinn, she'd called him. Quinn trotted back towards the doorway, his blaster held up as he poked his head out to scan the corridor. The fellow was obviously checking to confirm they hadn't alerted anyone during their approach to reach him. At least not yet, Draahg thought. He sneered at the bodies of Vengean’s soldiers that Lusiel’s Imperial had moved into the corner of the room.  "And I'm grateful, to you and to Baras both," Draahg told her. "Once Vengean is destroyed, I’ll prove it."

Lord Lusiel remained focused, "Just tell me that you know how to find him." She certainly gave no real consideration of Draahg’s supposed gratitude, didn’t even appear to believe him when he offered it. Draahg bit back a grin when she waved her hand through the air, seemingly indifferent. He thought she was adorable. Like a pet some child might keep for their own pleasing, that you stroked and cared for.  And sometimes kicked when it proved overly annoying.

He certainly didn’t believe she was truly capable of taking on Vengean. She was too slight, too tender and small a female creature. Draahg imagined she might cry the first time her pretty black hair was yanked free of the knot she’d fixed against the back of her head. But he pointed the way, "He's in his inner sanctum. Communing with the dark side, channeling his rage and power. I’m not certain you’ll manage to get much farther."

But Lusiel smiled meanly at him, “Don’t think to put your limitations to me. I’m not defined so simply. Just tell me what’s involved.” Draahg shook his head. _Unbelievable_ , he thought.

"If you’re certain, then I won’t stop you." Why would he do such a thing, at least. If Lusiel was destroyed, it would be one less apprentice that he had to overcome in winning a place for his own self. He told her, "There are three outer rings of Vengean's inner sanctum, guarded by some of his most powerful followers and apprentices. You'll have to get through them. I’ll meet you there. One of us has to obtain the key, first, and it might as well be me as you act to distract them."

Lusiel looked towards her officer first, saw the dark-haired fellow nod distinctly. Was she looking to this Imperial for approval? Draahg frowned, but then Lusiel returned her gaze to him and lifted her chin imperiously, "Fine. I'll meet you at the final gates." Lusiel turned, gestured towards the Imperial.

"So just like that? You're not concerned what sort of opponents you'll contend with?"

Lusiel shrugged. "No. If I fail, I'll be dead. Exactly what concerns would I have then? But I will not fail, and I know it. So I have no concerns at the moment, either."

Draahg blinked. The simplicity of her rationale displayed blunt directness, a fixed mindset and a focus that was purely exceptional. " _She is dangerously powerful_ ," Baras had said. Draahg watched her join her companion at the doorway, slip out and around towards the inner reaches of Vengean's chambers. Her backside was as sweetly curved as her front, he thought. He shifted and adjusted himself, thinking.

* * *

Vengean watched her enter the room and shook himself. He should have taken her from Baras when he had the chance, and his own personal failure offended him. This woman would have been enough to break Baras into the smallest pieces, if only he had her. But he had fooled himself, that he had time. He didn’t see what plots Baras was spinning in his webs, not in time enough.

Because the Sith walking towards him now was going to destroy him.

Baras would think he'd won. But he would be outdone by his own plotting. The Force sang to Vengean, whispered its truths. Motions and ripples, events to come and things unseen except by those almost barely touching so much potential right then. Vengean was powerful enough still, that he _saw_ Lusiel. Vengean watched her and knew she would destroy him. Oh, but she would destroy Baras, too. The wheels turning in her, through her were obvious enough to him, propelling her forward towards an inevitable confrontation.

She was a Sith who would rule before she was done, and he knew it!

She would not fail. Not today. And not when Baras faced her like this, too. " _Ah, Baras. You pitiful fool. You’ve already lost_ ," Vengean thought. "You know, everything Baras has today is because of you," he told her. "Your talents are wasted on him and it sickens me. Your master doesn't deserve you. He's a coward skulking in the shadows, hiding. Not like you."

But Lusiel shook her head at him, recognized his failure and deplored it as much as he did. Vengean almost smiled at her, very nearly proud to be one of the stepping stones along her way just then. She certainly didn’t stutter, "Your people already paid the price for your failure, and I’ll make sure their deaths meant that much. I will _end_ you."

Then Vengean smiled, activating his lightsaber as he prepared for their clash. He never even glanced at the drugged excuse of a Sith lordling who kissed Baras’ feet in supplication at every turn. He only ever faced Lusiel, smiling.

Because she was right. What a remarkable Sith. What a legacy she would create. He wished he might have seen it for himself.

* * *

"But, master. You didn't see her!" Draahg stood in front of Darth Baras, shaking his head. "It was glorious just to watch her. Beautiful. Like water flowing, a river. She was unmatched, my own efforts were a mere backdrop, only some decoration. Had I done nothing at all, she would've still managed the feat! To lose control of that kind of power, rather than use it to your advantage …"

Baras shook his head, "And what would you propose, apprentice? How would you control her?"

"An alliance, master. A formal one. Marriage ties. Your two most loyal and faithful apprentices, bound always and together. And if she were to fail you, I would be close enough to finally destroy her." Draahg breathed, his anticipation palpable. Baras was actually impressed at his apprentice's shrewdness. Draahg was usually far more blunt an instrument, rather.

"A truly masterful idea, Draahg. Would that it were possible. But no. Lord Lusiel has already acted to ensure it would never happen. Perhaps she anticipated such a control being brought to bear against her, even," Baras muttered thoughtfully as he considered the matter. He had received the records from Vaiken just as soon as they were input, in fact. Lusiel’s actions rather surprised him; she even took the man’s name! Stunning, he thought.

"How? What did she do?"

"Why, Draahg. It's quite simple. She's married. Very recently, in fact. I'm sure you even met him. I'm told she rarely ventures without him," Baras sounded amused as he chuckled, watched Draahg sink back on his heels and think. He was not accustomed to seeing such expressions on Draahg’s face and wondered how long it would take him to understand, counted the moments.

Draahg blinked furiously. There was only one man that he had seen nearby Lusiel, that she looked to and watched and called by name. But no Sith would do such a thing! "She wouldn't marry an Imperial! With no strength in the Force, even!"

Baras shrugged, "Quinn's a rather impressive Imperial, actually. I have hopes he can be utilized once Lusiel is out of the way. No, Draahg. She must be destroyed. Your desire to have her under you, in whatever capacity you take that word, will go unrealized. I'm actually rather sorry for it, mind you." Had he managed to control Lusiel using Draahg, then maybe she wouldn’t have to die.


	73. Sith and Non-Sith Relationships

"Vette, there is fur all over the ship. At this rate, we'll be able to market Broonmark's down for manufacture into pillows within the week," Quinn lifted his foot, broodily regarding the tuft of white Talz fur stuck to the sole of his boot. The fur that resulted in Quinn’s humiliating slide across the entry into the mess just then.

"But he likes it when I brush him out!"

"I'm not sure he'll like it so much when he's _bald_."

Pierce propped his chin against the palm of his hand on the tabletop as he watched the argument unfold, steam from the bowl in front of him drifting lazily up across his broad face. His breakfast of oats smothered with glazed apples and fruit compote wasn’t half so fascinating as the twi’lek stomping her small foot towards the Imperial officer, though. Most anyone would have been boggled to know such a thing could happen anywhere in the Empire, let alone in the mess of a ship that belonged to one of its fiercest Sith warriors. Quinn certainly didn't respond to Vette's audacity as any other Imperial would, didn't twist her lekku or lash her face with a hard slap. No, he only rolled his eyes at her and spoke of a hairless Talz.

Pierce was actually amused at the utter incongruity. He just barely bit back a grin. Jaesa offered a little laugh from the other side of the table, though. Pierce glanced over at her, "He acts more like her daddy than he does the captain of this crew."

"Oh, don't say that to Vette! She'd start calling him daddy every chance she gets, just to needle at him! And think, eventually there will be some small person running around here who really does call Quinn father,” Jaesa giggled at the thought.

But Pierce snorted. Giving Lord Lusiel an heir would certainly seal the deal for the captain, he supposed. Which was quite enough to ruin his meal, mind you. Watching Quinn thrust a broom into Vette's hands and then duck Vette’s playful swipe at him with the thing wasn’t enough to soothe his resentment. Damn know-it-all officers and their damned maneuvering. By the time Quinn approached the table to retrieve a bowl, Pierce had built himself up into a regular fit of offended pride.

Jaesa greeted the captain as he began eating his food, grinning madly, "Where is Lord Lusiel this morning, Quinn?"

"She is still sleeping, actually."

"Oh. You must have kept her up too late," Jaesa tsked at Quinn with a twisted look of amusement glinting her golden eyes.

"I hardly think it's appropriate to discuss such things at the breakfast table, my lord."

"Really? Can we discuss them over dinner, then?"

"No."

"Lunch?"

"I really would like to finish eating."

Jaesa laughed aloud. Quinn very blatantly ignored her, pointing with his spoon towards Vette and raising his eyebrows as she idled over the floor with the broom. The twi’lek stuck her tongue out at him.

Pierce suddenly tossed a datapad into the center of the table. "Captain, you should read this. It's a new study examining Sith and non-Sith relationships. Did you know Siths are over two hundred percent more likely to commit adultery than ordinary people?"

Silence fell like lead over the mess as everyone froze. Even Toovee's annoying whining stopped. Quinn slowly reached over to pick up the datapad. He glanced at its surface briefly, intoned, "Lieutenant, I once made the mistake of calculating my lord's talents and skills as if she were a _typical_ Sith. It was a mistake, of course. The words typical and ordinary should never be applied to my wife. I truly hope you come to that same understanding quickly." Quinn stood up, "Because if you ever insult her like that again, I will make sure you regret it."

Vette was standing by the door, her lekku twitching as Quinn passed her through the door. She grimaced when she saw his bowl of uneaten cereal and fruit left behind on the table, "Dammit, Pierce, what the hell was that?"

"Ah, come on! Doesn't it bite you in the craw he only married her for the chance she'd advance him through the ranks? I don't have respect for officers like that, who’re more concerned with their own place than with the battles they wage," Pierce sneered.

Vette was trembling with anger by the time he finished. "I won't waste my time with such amazing idiocy. Hell, even Toovee is smarter than you!" She tossed the broom down and stormed out of the mess.

Pierce muttered angrily as he spun back to face his bowl again. Then he caught sight of Jaesa. She was glaring at him from across the table, her gold-colored eyes narrowed and sharp-looking. He imagined piercing blades coming at him from those eyes, and flinched.

Pierce gulped, began to edge himself back and away from the table. Jaesa stood up.

The first blow sent him flying back into the nearby wall and sent a hard booming sound through the ship as his chestplate clanged wildly on impact. The second came when a chair suddenly hit him in the gut. The third actually made him let loose an "oof" when he felt his bowl thud against the side of his head.

"Exactly what is going on in here?"

Both of them looked towards the doorway of the mess to find Lusiel standing there, staring at them with a bemused expression on her face. Pierce grunted morosely from his still frozen place up against the wall. Oatmeal slid soddenly down the side of his face. But Jaesa smiled at her, "We're playing a game, master. Would you care to join us?"

Lusiel stood there, frowning, "I'm not sure what he did but you can't break him, Jaesa." Jaesa pouted artfully. But Lusiel wagged her finger towards her, "I mean it."

"Very well, master. I won't _break_ him. Although he deserves it."

Lusiel shook her head as she turned and left.

Jaesa turned back to glare at Pierce again. He glowered at her, "What exactly do you think this is going to accomplish? It’s not like I’m going to change my mind about the git!"

She suddenly leered at him. He frowned as Jaesa canted her hip to one side, adopting a purely sultry stance before she began sauntering closer to his frozen position against the wall. Pierce squirmed, as Jaesa reached up and grasped his head along both sides. She pulled him down until his mouth was aligned with hers. Pierce moaned as Jaesa began nibbling along his lower lip. She pressed herself even closer to him, pushed her hips up against his. She pulled his thigh between her legs and began rubbing herself back and forth on him.

Jaesa laughed softly when Pierce groaned loudly against her mouth, chanted her name. "If I were you, lieutenant, I'd be far more concerned about your own Sith and non-Sith relationship, than my master's."

"We don't have a relationship! We fuck every so often, is all."

"Are you saying you would be all right with me fucking someone else, then? Since that's what Sith do two hundred percent of the time, I mean."

Pierce scowled at her.

Jaesa laughed, "I thought so."

"I'm _nothing_ like him, Jaesa, damn it."

Jaesa shook her head at him, the humor sliding away suddenly, "Oh, I know that, Pierce. Trust me. He loves her, after all." Pierce scoffed but she only stared at him. So he frowned, stilled into thoughtfulness. And Jaesa finally turned and left him there, so that Pierce slowly slid down the wall into an oatmeal-slathered heap.


	74. Last Will

"You will bow to me when in the presence of outsiders, or you will be punished severely. Am I understood?" Darth Baras was glaring at her from behind that mask, she just knew it. Why he was pressing for her posturing, though. Well, that was confusing.

Lusiel looked up at him and spoke firmly, her dark eyes cold and hating, "I do speak Basic, yes." There was a burst of alarm from behind her, as Quinn shifted and stepped closer to her. Lusiel ignored him, staring unafraid up at Baras’ holoimage without blinking. Baras held up one of his pudgy hands.

"This is petty of you. Why must you task me? This is a time of greatness for us, _apprentice_ ," Baras scolded her. The digging reminder of her place, the subtle threat … Lusiel pursed her lips together. Baras might have been only flexing the muscles of his new place on the Council. But Lusiel had never kotowed to the man and refused to start now. She sniffed as Baras declared to her, "We are at war! I have been placed in charge of its course. You and Lord Draahg will oversee the most crucial confrontations. Draahg is already deployed. Now I will unleash you."

_Like she was a dog_ , Lusiel thought snidely. "Where are you sending me, my lord?" She listened as Baras described her return to the planet of Quesh, but only vaguely. She mostly left it to Quinn and Pierce to consider the absurd strategy.

Instead, she studied her master through narrowed eyes. She watched the way he moved, the way his ordinary mannerisms betrayed him. He was excited, almost quivered with it. It was so heady he couldn’t quite keep his feelings entirely hidden from her. Baras was lying. She could feel the deceit like it was a blanket reaching out to envelop her, smothering her. She glanced at her apprentice, saw Jaesa frowning at Baras, too.

So it was finally time, then. Baras was going to try and kill her. Lusiel didn’t bother wondering why. The man would be an idiot if he didn't try to kill her, actually.  And while she’d call Baras any dozen insulting names, idiot would never be one of them. “ _At last_ ,” was all she could really think just then.

"I find myself nostalgic, sending my most prized apprentice off to war. This is the culmination of everything we've done together," Baras actually did sound emotional as he addressed her. How touching, Lusiel thought. She nearly asked him if he was tearing up behind that dumb mask. But she ignored the temptation.

"The poignancy of this moment is not lost on me, master." Lusiel remembered the first time she met Baras, that long ago day back on Korriban. She had known that day she would eventually be forced to fight against Baras, that it was only a matter of time. It was heady, facing the moment finally.

"Poignancy. You've hit on the perfect word to describe where we are, my friend. I bid you … farewell." He sounded amused just before the holotransmission faded. Lusiel snorted loudly then.

_Coward_ , Lusiel thought. Darth Baras remained the poorest excuse for a Sith she'd ever known. Too much of a damn weakling to come out from behind his mask, to face his enemies head on, to do anything whatsoever to actually fight. Vengean was right. Baras sat hidden in the shadows, like a fat spider in the middle of a web, growing fat off the labors of others dumb enough to become trapped in his glutinous manipulations.

It was time to play the game for real, to keep the bug she'd had to call master for far too long from squashing her.

* * *

"Have you lost your mind?" Quinn was angry. He gripped her arms, shook her slightly. She tried shaking her head at him, but he waved his hand and refused to let her speak. "No. If you believe Baras is going to try and harm you, I have to be there. Lusiel! Damn it, think!"

"It's a trap, Quinn! I know it! It's a cloying thing, this knowing. It feels like a noose going around my neck. But I can't discern how the attack will come. It's better if you stay behind, provide security here at the ship. If something happens to me you can come and help," Lusiel implored him. Logic be damned, she thought. She didn’t want him hurt!

"That's an absurd course of action," Quinn began pacing, his mind working fast and all his mental doors began flying open as he formulated possibilities, options. "There won't be a move against the ship, if you're not on it. No, an attack will be made while you're away and apart from the rest of the crew, if only because he's sure you're weakened that way."

She opened her mouth, prepared to argue with him. But Quinn reached out and held her shoulders, looked directly into her eyes. He was so damned adamant, "Listen to me, Lusiel! He'll do his best to hurt you. I have to be there. It has to be _me_. None of the others could heal you if it was necessary."

Lusiel hung her head. She was acting irrationally, making an emotionally charged decision, rather than a strategic one. She knew Quinn was capable. She had to trust him, rather than the sense of disaster that was gradually engulfing her. She nodded. "Gather the supplies you think most useful, Malavai. Be prepared."

Quinn pulled her close, wrapped his arms around her, "It will be all right." He tried to assure her, but he sensed it was useless. Whatever compulsions the Force made on a Sith were moving against her right then, and he couldn’t really soothe her.

"Just go. Hurry. Before I change my mind. You have no idea how much my senses are screaming at me right now."

Lusiel watched as Quinn turned and left the bridge. She waited several moments, standing idly in front of the viewport and gazing at the planet of Quesh below. Then she settled herself at the communications terminal, "I’ve arrived at Quesh, where I'm facing an uncertain task. I'm positive this is a trap. If anything happens to me, I leave it to you to ensure my husband is kept secure. You’re the only one I trust to see it’s done … He is to have all that I possessed. I love you, Khy." She coded the message, using algorithms they'd long since designated secure and forgoing the usual game. Then she pressed send.


	75. Testing me again

There really were Republic soldiers in the bunker where Baras directed her. Lusiel stopped when she saw them crouching down in the dusty corner, fiddling with a rather impressive series of explosive devices as she stood there watching them. Lucky her, they were even chatting up a storm, their face masks making their voices sound scratchy and mechanical, "So are we active? Is that strange problem resolved?"

"Sir, I’d say yes. Everything reads as good to go, so your detonator should be active."

"Then let's pack up. We'll blow this whole place sky high, along with the Imperial command center up above."

Lusiel frowned with consternation, studying the entire bunker with a sweeping glance. Trying to find the trap, because everything in her was singing, singing that it was all a trap. But why were the soldiers there? Who _sent_ them? Although, she certainly wasn’t going to allow the fools some chance to destroy anything of the Empire in the meantime, and she boldly stepped out into their line of sight, snapping at them, “Only cowards fight from the shadows.” Quinn pressed close behind her, scanning all around them, too. Just as tense and uneasy as she was, Lusiel thought.

"Sir, we've been discovered! Is that a … Sith? A real one?" Lusiel didn’t smile at the men’s ordinary, common reaction, only shifted her weight onto one single foot as the troopers owlishly blinked at her. She only watched to see if they might warp into an actual threat somehow.

"Stow it! This isn’t some scary story your mommy told you, here.” The Republic squad’s leader turned, sneering at her as he raised up a detonator switch with menacing promise. Lusiel tensed as she watched him. “So yea, Sithy little girl. I don’t really give a shit if we all die, here. Always knew there was a chance of it. You’d better back off, now!”

But Lusiel only shrugged. At least then the trap would be exposed, she thought. "By all means. Let’s get this over with. Do it." She stepped closer, just one bold step. The troopers stumbled backwards, all in a unit and almost by rote. Lusiel rather imagined they could dance together in this single rhyming motion, back and forth.

"Fuck! This isn’t a joke, Sith!" The officer in his fine Republic-embossed armor held out the detonator and pressed the button, so they all listened to the click of the device. Everyone froze, froze, waiting. Lusiel raised one of her eyebrows, smirking, and Quinn sighed loudly. The Republic man started shaking, "Come on! Dammit, work!" Click … click … click …

"Oh, please.” Lusiel pulled her lightsaber free, watched its red glow illuminate the faces of the soldiers in front of her, “If death is really what you want so much, I can more than help.” She smiled, just before she flung her saber straight towards the group.

The one she took for a demolitions engineer stumbled back, crying out pitifully as Lusiel’s blade impacted along the side of his head. His skull spit apart under the force of the blow, almost like a piece of fruit that Toovee prepared for one of their finer meals. Lusiel only yanked back then, retrieving her weapon and thrilling to its wild, pulsing call in her hand again. Then she flew at the next trooper, striking him straight from the air along the length of both his shoulders so he went down like a rock, yelping loudly. He managed to raise up his rifle, at least. But Lusiel swung out with her lightsaber, neatly cutting the rifle itself entirely in half.

The soldier yelled at her, madly throwing the useless butt of rifle up at her as he skittered backwards across the dirt-covered floor. Lusiel ducked and then stomped her foot into the trooper’s stomach, holding him in place as she lashed out at the next sorry soldier. There was a pinging peel of sound as Quinn shot his blaster, and Lusiel felt the man beneath her boot jerk. She glanced down just long enough to see the hole in the side of his throat, the blood pooling under his head.

Then Lusiel stepped forward, one single step, and she sank her lightsaber deep into the gut of the trooper trying to get away from her, his hands held up in supplication. He opened his mouth, dropping his hands down until they clasped her own wrists where she was holding her lightsaber tightly. Blood gushed from his mouth, turning his crying into wet-sounded gurgles as he died.

The squad's leader was crouched back at the explosives, frantically working to detonate the bombs. He was muttering wildly. "Has to work, it has to! Come on …! Work, blast it! Just work!" Lusiel turned, pointing at him, "Let me put you out of your misery." Then she lifted the man, Force-pushing him across the space until he thudded roughly hard against a wall. He coughed, once, again. Then Lusiel clenched her fist and jerked against his neck, breaking it, and he finally slumped down onto the floor.

Lusiel exhaled slowly, watching the dead man as if he might jump back up to come at her again. But Quinn trotted over towards the explosives, rather. He examined the apparatus with discerning eyes, lifted the detonator up to consider it. Then he looked over at Lusiel, grimacing, “This isn’t the correct detonator, my lord. Although it _is_ wired to a detonator.” He breathed in slowly, “Someone else is holding it.”

Lusiel’s nostrils flared as she gestured at him, angrily pointing towards the far doorway leading out of the bunker, “Go, Quinn. Fast.” Quinn rushed to his feet, scampering several spaces in front of Lusiel before her commlink began to warble and call. They both froze, and Lusiel scowled as she slowly activated the link. Lusiel snarled towards the image of Draahg, bitterly angry, “You have it.”

"I’m not surprised you figured it out.” Draahg smiled thinly at her, “Baras was rather pleased you would be able to merit accolades for having died in the midst of halting a dastardly Republic attack on the Imperial command post. No one will ever know it was one of his own moles that sent the Republic troopers in the first place.” Draahg held up another detonator switch, waved it back and forth as he grinned widely. Lusiel considered telling him to play the game better. Exposing your sheerest pleasure in winning was simply … undignified.

Lusiel glared at him through narrowed eyes, "Draahg, I _will_ kill you if you do this."

Draahg pressed his lips together, hesitating only briefly. She seemed so certain, after all. But he eventually smiled at her again, "Well that would be a truly amazing trick, I suppose.” Draahg glanced sideways, towards Quinn. He shook his head, “I really would’ve saved you, you know. Even argued with Baras over it. You’re so … temptingly female. But you’d already lowered yourself to wed an Imperial instead.”

She didn’t look at Quinn, fought to keep Draahg’s attention focused on her rather, "Because you lack any sort of imagination, of course. You’d likely fiddle yourself uselessly against my sex, until I was utterly bored. I married better than you!"

He glared at her, "Then it’s good you’ll be buried there together. So you won’t be bored!”

Lusiel watched Draahg’s finger tighten over the switch, heard the click ringing loudly over the link. Then she heard the first booming explosion. Lusiel spun, maddened, sent Quinn flying with a huge Force push towards the opening of the cavern. She heard him cry out her name, heard him yelling, “Lusiel!”  

She heard another explosion. Then another. A large rock fell from the top of the cavern's roof; it struck her shoulder, breaking the bone with an obscene crunching sound. Lusiel screamed as she fell. She lay on the ground, watching flames shooting, flying over her head. She heard the champing sounds of metals tearing apart, watched a long thin pipe come loose from the machine parts above her. The pipe flew at her, hit her across the chest. Pain exploded as her ribs broke under the crushing force of the blow.

And she didn’t hear anything else.

* * *

Lusiel saw some light etching its way past her weary eyelids.   
She blinked, tried to clear her vision. Failed. Everything wavered.   
Her chest hurt.   
Two faces appeared above her. Sith. Purebloods. Red skin and eyes.   
Staring down at her.   
She heard them speaking to each other.

"Interest justified. Shall I revive?"

"No. We must be sure."

Darkness again. Wake up, Lusiel!   
She fought to open her eyes, fought.   
Always a test, she thought.   
Khyriel! They’re testing me again!

"If she survives the trek to safety, then her worth will be established."

She saw them again. Two Sith, looking down at her.   
She blinked at them.   
She felt them. Powerful. Judging her.   
She felt … another presence. It was far away.   
An _awesome_ power, licking against her senses. More judgement.   
Then it was gone. Just the two Sith now.  
They left her there.

She tried to speak.   
She groaned his name.   
"Malavai."

Dark again.


	76. Trust no one

Quinn came to awareness when the ground rumbled underneath him. He coughed, felt his lungs protesting. The air was saturated with smoke and dust. "Lusiel!" He looked around, frantic. A heavy metal pipe was shattered above him, leaning haphazardly against the cavern wall aside him. The blasted thing had served as a barrier against other debris, preventing him from being crushed.

He felt no gratitude, though. Just more desperate as he looked around him.

He hissed as he began dragging himself out from under the metal and rocks. His side ached. He looked down, saw a dusty tear in his coat on the right side of his abdomen. He muttered to himself, "Blunt trauma. Interior bleeding certainly, and at least. Possible liver damage. Probably caused by a falling rock."

He yanked up his sleeve, exposed his marriage cuff. He depressed a catch on the side, watched as it began blinking. He followed the signal and called out to Lusiel again. He called his wife! He maneuvered through the debris, pushed aside several rocks. He climbed over another large pipe. Then he saw her, heard the responding beeping coming from her matching armlet. "Lusiel!" He reached her, pulled a pipe that was laying across her chest up and off of her, tossed it aside.

The ground rumbled again, as the entire bunker shuddered dangerously from the damage caused by the explosions. The entire place was unstable. Quinn glanced up, saw the shaking ceiling above him. There was no time! He yanked his pack open, pulled out his scanner. Lusiel's shoulder was broken and dislocated, an obvious concussion injury. But it was her chest that was in the most trouble. Five ribs were broken and her lungs had been punctured in three separate locations. She was suffocating on her own blood.

Quinn worked rapidly to stabilize her. He programmed his medical probe carefully, waited for a moment as it twirled into the air and started working to reinflate her right lung so that she could breathe again. He listened for the pulse of air coming from her throat, heard her gasp softly. He felt breathless himself for only a moment, watched stars twirling in his vision and blinked quickly to keep from falling unconscious. He pulled a stim from the pack, applied it to his side and moaned from the pain. It hurt!

Another quake of the ground. He glanced over at the little, whirling droid, saw it blinking in success. Lusiel was breathing. Barely. She needed to be in a kolto tank. He had to move her, knew it would hurt her. But there was no time and no other choice!

He leaned over, carefully picked her up. He cradled her against his chest. He followed the path he'd cleared through the rubble to reach her, found the corridor leading out of the cavern. The ground continued shaking even as he moved along, rocks trembling down the sides of the wall. He moved steadily, surely, holding her against him and biting his lip hard enough blood spilled over his tongue. Because every single step hurt!

But he refused to let her go.

* * *

Vette was the first one who responded to Quinn's holocall. "What did you forget this time …? Quinn? What the hell? Quinn!"

Pierce dropped the rifle butt he was working over with a cloth as Vette's cry sounded through the ship. He rushed through the hallway of the ship towards the holoterminal in the lounge. He raced to Vette's side, saw she was crying and yanked her back away from the terminal.

Quinn's image showed him kneeling on the ground, Lord Lusiel lying across his thighs as he tightened the buckles holding her face mask across her features. They were outside what looked to be a cave opening and very obviously injured. Lusiel wasn't even moving. Was she _dead_? Quinn’s eyes glittered like ice shards above his face mask as he looked towards the commlink, holding his side. They were dusty, dirty.

Quinn started talking and never mind the pain biting him, "Vette, enough! Lieutenant, we need retrieval. You must be quick. I'm sending our coordinates now. And lieutenant?" Quinn looked at him. "Trust no one except our own. No one. Do you understand?" Each member of the Wing’s crew was intrinsically bound to the success or failure of the Sith Lord bleeding out onto the Quesh mud right now. If she died, they were screwed. Pierce knew it, and Quinn counted on it.

"I understand, captain. We're on the way. Sit tight."

"I'm not moving."

Quinn's image blinked out. Pierce moved. Vette followed him, watched as he tossed on his armor and helmet, pulled out his weapons and strapped them on.

"Baras did this, Pierce. He tried to kill her," Jaesa was stunned. What if Lusiel died? What would happen to them?

"Jaesa, that's not important right now. We have to get them back to the ship before whoever did this realizes they're still alive and vulnerable. Do you understand?" Pierce looked at her, utterly serious.

Jaesa nodded. Battle was good. It invigorated, it thrilled. Better to focus on possible battle, to _do_ something. Pierce ignored her simple naivety, just waited as she asked him for direction, "What do you want me to do?"

"You'll come with me. We'll retrieve them via speeder. Vette, listen to me! You have to remain here and secure the ship. If anyone but us tries to get onto the ship, kill them. No questions asked, just fucking kill them. Use the Talz, too. Do you both understand?"

Vette and Jaesa nodded. Pierce grunted, grabbed a blade and stuck it into the sheath on his right boot. He pointed towards the airlock doors, "Move."


	77. The Emperor's Hand

"So you _are_ worthy to be the Emperor's Wrath."

Lusiel studied him, ignoring the supposed compliment as she considered his familiar features. Those same rich, red eyes gleaming at her out of a blood red-skinned face. Oh, and his companion, too. The quiet one, under his hood. So much harder to see his golden eyes shining back at her when she was no longer laying straight on her back and looking up at them both. That he was plainly fascinated as he watched her seemed strange enough, too.

Both of the Purebloods thrummed with terrible power. Lusiel glared at them for it.

Quinn pressed close behind her, his concern aching through to her. His hand was clenched on the butt of his blaster, but he wisely kept it holstered on his side. Pierce was standing guardedly near the doorway to this bunker, his hands hanging loosely at his sides. She didn’t doubt he would easily, simply yank up his rifle if it proved necessary. He was just so rigidly strong, standing in front of Jaesa and blocking the two Purebloods from really examining her wide-eyed apprentice. Even Jaesa was clutching her lightsaber preparedly, there behind him.

_Her_ people, Lusiel thought. She was satisfied they were loyal enough. So she confronted the Purebloods certainly, adamantly strong the way she needed to be right then. Because they were counting on her for direction, "You've got to the count of three to explain yourselves. I saw you there. So why have you followed me? What do you want?"

She had awakened in the medical bay on the ship, dripping wet from the moisture of the kolto tank. Quinn was hovering over her, his blue eyes shining brilliantly with emotion. She reached for him, roughly grabbed his arm as her senses flew out and over him. She whispered to him, "Were you hurt?" But he only shrugged. Like it wasn’t important and which was answer enough. And the anger bloomed in her, burned in her and flamed brightly powerful. A raging force that had only one possible end.  

For every single twinge of pain Quinn had felt, she would rip Baras to pieces!

But then she directed them to find the Purebloods, remembered how they looked down at her there in the wreckage. None of her people were comfortable with Lusiel's determination to find the strangers, let alone to confront them. Likely because she couldn’t explain the driving need she felt to seek them out. Quinn argued with her right there in front of everyone, insisted the Purebloods were somehow compelling her. It was another example of how agitated Quinn was by what had happened, that he didn’t even pull her into privacy before pointing angrily towards her. It actually stunned Pierce into open-mouthed wonderment!

But Lusiel was only more enraged then. That Quinn was driven to such extremes was only another example how much damage was done, anyway. _Ah, Malavai … he hurt you so much!_ So she swore at them abruptly, "I _have_ to. That's the end of it." They all stood there staring at her slack-mouthed for long moments, before turning to plan and gather their weapons. Every one of them would’ve followed behind her, except that Quinn and Pierce together insisted Vette remain on the ship with Broonmark to keep it secure. She was the one who worked best with the Talz, Quinn pointed out.

Lusiel only remained silent as they went about their hurried preparations. She was contemplative, concentrating on the sense she'd gotten of that _other_ presence as she lay down there, hurt and barely aware. It was so vastly powerful, beyond anything she’d ever sensed before. Even distant the way it was, _that_ was the compulsion pressing at her to find the Purebloods. Refusing it seemed nearly impossible, although she didn’t even try. She was just too curious to think of denying it.  And now she faced them.

"There’s no need for fear, nor anger. We’re allies, here. Friends, even. I am Servant One and this this is Servant Two." Like so many Purebloods, this one was bareheaded. Lusiel had often wondered why the red-skinned Sith tended so often to eschew hair on top of their heads, actually. But maybe his quiet companion actually had locks under that hood of his, she thought. Who knows? He stayed quiet as One intoned with imperious authority, “We’re the Emperor’s Hand. We alone oversee His will in the galaxy.”

Lusiel snorted softly. She tended to believe the Emperor managed will enough, not to depend on _any_ particular servant so completely. But she only shrugged, "What does that have to do with me?"

That’s when Two sang like a trilling bird, "You have been called!" Lusiel glanced at him, frowning. She could still just barely discern his eyes underneath the hood. But she sensed he was …broken. Not dangerous, so much as _wrong_. It was the _other_ presence in him that caught at her attention, though; she saw it staring back at her from his shattered gaze. Two’s nostrils flared and his eyes widened as he watched her.

"The Emperor tasks the Hand with a great undertaking, and you are to become his Wrath," Servant One declared. Like he was publishing some proclamation for everyone to consider with fulsome glory! Lusiel wondered if she should cheer, actually. Except that One suddenly glared at her, "Darth Baras seizes power against the Emperor's wishes. He must be stopped." Lusiel glared back at him, then.

"You sense the truth. You feel _his_ presence," Servant Two pattered forward, reaching out as if to touch Lusiel. But Quinn tensed and pressed himself even closer to Lusiel, his fingers tightening against the handle of his blaster as he studied the Pureblood. Two stopped, glanced at the Imperial and then nodded, stepping back again.

Servant One grunted approvingly, taking in the gathering of Lusiel's people. "You have won an impressive degree of loyalty from your followers. It is another sign of your strength. We approve."

Lusiel raised her chin. She wasn’t concerned with winning their approval. She only wanted Baras’ big, fat head. On a stick! "Tell me what you know of Baras’ intentions, then."

"The betrayer plays Emperor," Servant Two said. Lusiel frowned at him again, confused. So Servant One explained, “The Emperor has worked to undertake something extraordinary, so he’s been silent. Baras used His silence to claim the Emperor is speaking through him, rather. He’s called himself the Voice. It is a lie.” How like Baras, Lusiel thought. The manipulative bastard.

"My lord? What is the Voice?” Jaesa murmured curiously. She tried maneuvering around Pierce, to better see the two Servants. But Pierce grunted and stepped sideways, blocking her again. She prodded him in the shoulder angrily, quickly jabbing him with pointed fingers. Pierce just rolled his shoulder negligently, and didn’t budge.

"The Voice is the conduit for the Emperor's words. The Emporer chooses one being to physically embody. That being is the Voice. It is obeyed as the Emperor himself," Servant One clarified.

"But the true Voice has been … silenced," Servant Two spoke mournfully.

"And in its absence, there is none to deny Baras' claim."

Lusiel bent her head, thinking. They didn't say the Voice was dead. Trapped? How would someone trap the being who embodied the Emperor himself? Was it even possible? "Are you sending me to free him, then?"

Servant One narrowed his eyes at her. She didn't assume the Voice was dead; she surmised correctly, rather. Interesting, he thought. Intelligence such as that was attractive, and dangerous all at once.  "In time. For now, it is essential to undermine Baras' efforts. He seeks support on the Dark Council. Some on the Council truly believe; others see an advantage in supporting him. And Baras plots against those who oppose him."

"The Wrath must build before reaching pitch," Servant Two interjected, trilling all over again. She rather wanted him to stop saying anything. If only because his lost, pitiful tone was discomfiting.

Lusiel sighed. Moving in song and concert, her lightsaber in hand, as Servant Two intimated – that was motion she understood. It was soothing, easy, comfortable. It offered purpose and direction, assured her how to position herself, where to stand and what to do … she understood, and the understanding settled her for the first time since she knew Baras was moving against her finally.

That _other_ presence sang to her, then. It was so brief she might have missed it, except that the feeling was so incredible. She was judged interesting, strong and worthy. It was right.

* * *

They watched the new Wrath leave.

"Blood they share, unknowing."

Servant One nodded, "She looks much as her sister does, yes."

"Scourge serves the other now."

Servant One frowned, angered at the reminder of Scourge’s betrayal: "In time, he will face the true Emperor's Wrath, the one who bore his new master’s face first. _She_ will punish him."

"It should be that way."

One frowned over at him, then.

Because what _should_ be was very rarely what actually happened.


	78. Hold onto Each Other

They were all gathered in the lounge, every one of them tense and restless. Lusiel considered each one of them, her dark gaze sliding from one to the next with ceaseless curiosity. Vette's lekku were twitching, of course. She kept bobbling against the bench she was leaning on, and it was no surprise the twi’lek said something before anyone else.

"Well. Those Hand weirdoes kind of creep me out,” Vette blurted. She looked around at the rest of the crew, “So are we really going up for this? Some big fight against a high-faluting Council member himself now? You know what they do to people who mess up in fights against the Council?" Vette shuddered, “We could go somewhere safe from Baras, my lord. Like far away!”

But Lusiel shook her head, "Vette, we knew this would happen eventually. I’m Sith, and I fight or I die. And I refuse to die. So here we are, then. My old Master is my new enemy, as it should be."

Jaesa interjected, her yellow eyes gleaming with eagerness, "Well, I for one am happy for this development, master. There’s power to be seized in this struggle, and I want it!" Pierce hummed from where he was standing near the game table, his hip leaned smoothly against its edge. He was hardly so sanguine as Jaesa. But he still shrugged over at Lusiel, "Never cared much for that old man Baras, anyway. You look better chasing behind, my lord." Jaesa kicked against his foot from under the game table, and he stumbled slightly, catching himself on the table’s edge.

Even Broonmark warbled approvingly, "Vengeance feeds us. It will be like Fetzellen!"

Only Quinn stayed silent. He shook his head as he regarded all of them, then turned abruptly and walked firmly out of the room. The rest of them squirmed restlessly, as Lusiel watched him go and then turned her burning gaze back to them again. She told them, “We're secure enough for now, because Baras thinks I'm dead. He’ll learn the truth before too long, I’m sure. We must be prepared!" Then Lusiel stood up and followed her husband.

The lounge was silent for several moments. Jaesa suddenly jumped to her feet, "I should try meditating on the day's events." They watched her moving excitedly to her quarters, although Vette snorted. "Even I can tell she's so not going to meditate. Come on, Broonmark. I'll brush your coat." The Talz obediently followed along behind the twi'lek.

Pierce only sat there, staring after Jaesa. Then he jumped, startled when Toovee blurted right next to him, "Would you like to play a game of chess, sir?" Pierce glared at the droid, "You really do want me to rip your arms out of their sockets, don’t you? Dammit! Go away!" Pierce pointed a thick fingers towards the mess, watched as Toovee trundled out from the lounge.

Then he moved towards Jaesa's quarters, pulling at the buckles of his breastplate as he went. He didn't knock or call out to her; he just opened the door and stepped inside. Jaesa spun around to face him, trembling. She snarled at him, "What are you doing in here? Get out!" But Pierce just dropped his breastplate onto the floor next to the door, locking it behind him.

"You're shaking, Jaesa. Meditate, my ass. Try coming up with a better excuse next time," Pierce shook his head at her as he stepped closer, his hands moving to lift his shirt over his head.

"Don't you dare! I'm not in the mood."

Pierce chuckled approvingly at her, "Oh, yes, you are. You want it so much you're about to come just thinking about it."

"Damn you! You don't tell me how I'm feeling!" Jaesa swung out just as Pierce came close enough, her palm smacking smoothly against his cheek, spinning his head around. He laughed at her, then.

"Harder, Jaesa. You know how much I like it. Hells, leave marks this time. Feels good to see them later on and know you put them there."

Jaesa spun around, dramatically ignoring him. She crossed her arms over her chest. "I hate you, Pierce."

"I love the way you hate me, though. Do it some more," Pierce grabbed her from behind, pushed her forward over the edge of her bed. He yanked at the lower edge of her robe, pulling it up over her long legs to bare her backside. He rumbled deeply as he took in the sight of her buttocks rising sweetly into the air, watched her wiggle under his heated gaze.

Jaesa grumbled at him angrily and pushed herself up, trying to knock Pierce back from where he was pressed against her. So he growled down at her. He roughly pushed her down until her face was buried in the bed cushions and he yanked her arms around behind her, gripping both her wrists in one of his meaty hands to hold her in place. Then he slapped her resoundingly on the right cheek of her upraised ass, admiring the wash of pink against her skin.

Jaesa bucked against him, shrieking angrily. But Pierce groaned as he felt her wiggling against his groin. He ground himself into her, then slapped her again. "Come on, Jaesa. You're really exciting me." He reached under her, ran his fingers along the seam of her sex, “You’re so fucking wet.” He thrummed her clit quite happily for several moments, listened to her trying to muffle her moans against the bed.

Pierce reached for the front of his pants. Jaesa yelped when she heard the clasp of his armored leg pieces unbuckling, heard them clink loudly when they hit the floor. She reared back again, “Get off me, you oaf!” But then she gasped as her bare butt cheeks glided over Pierce’s naked thighs. He chucked again, leaning down to whisper against her ear, licked her there, “Oh yea, Jaesa. I like it, too."

They both moaned as he pressed himself into her.

"You in the mood now, Jaesa?"

"Dammit, Pierce. Do it!"

"Do what? What do you want me to do?"

Jaesa twisted underneath him, snarled, "Just fuck me!"

"Oh, yea. I can do that."

* * *

Broonmark huddled in his comfortable space in the cargo area of the ship, its temporary walls working to ensure that the temperature in his corner was sweetly cold. All around him the floor was littered with clumps of his fur that the Twi'lek had brushed from him, creating what amounted to a nest where he could rest himself.

He sat there, crooning softly to the small blue one everyone called Vette. She'd crawled into his arms after brushing him, and fallen asleep. She was finally quiet. Not that Broonmark disliked her constant chattering. He actually enjoyed the way she didn't hesitate to talk to him, rather than assuming he couldn't understand what he was being told.

Vette was the only one who consistently spent time with him, made him feel less alone on the ship. He liked her. Lord Lusiel approved of their friendship, too. He knew it, because she'd patted him when she noticed he was kind to the little creature. She told him, "I expect you to keep her safe from harm, Broonmark." He welcomed the task. Vette was a cute pet.

And watching over her meant there was always an enemy worth killing. Because so many of them became angry when the little twi’lek chattered at them entertainingly and then they stupidly threatened her. Life was good.

* * *

Quinn was pacing when Lusiel entered their quarters. She stopped to watch him, crossing her arms over her chest as she counted the turns he made back and forth. She knew he was agitated; but she couldn’t actually gauge what he was thinking just then. So she only stood there, confusedly watching him.

"Why are you angry with me, Quinn?" Lusiel finally pondered aloud.

He stopped with his back to her, then turned around to face her. He reported, like he was citing some formal statement: "You received a message while you were recovering in the kolto and I decrypted it. The sender requested _immediate_ confirmation of your welfare. I believe his exact words were, 'You'd better let me know you're all right or I will come find you.' He included a time limit for your response."

Lusiel caught the corner of her mouth between her teeth, trying not to laugh at him, "Well. Have I already run out of time, then?”

“No. You have exactly six hours and thirty-nine minutes left.” He was growling now.

Lusiel smirked at him, “Malavai, are you jealous?"

"No." Quinn ran his fingers through his hair, "I don't know! Maybe. Void, I don't even know what to feel! I feel lost in my own head! Every time I close my eyes I see you floating there in the tank. Or worse, the way you were laying there in the damn dirt. The dirt!" He spun around and slammed a fist down onto the desk, rattling the datapads she'd stacked there. He hung his head. “He made me lay you down in the dirt! Even though you were loyal, even after I … Damn him!”

"Malavai," Lusiel breathed his name. She stepped close, reached up to touch his face in a gesture she'd been making since their first days together, running her fingers up and along his jaw to push his hair back against his brow and tickle the edge of his ear. She leaned up to let her mouth follow the same path, nibbling against his jaw. Then she whispered into his ear, "He tried to kill me. Tried. He failed. Now I'll kill him. And no one will gainsay me. Not with the Emperor backing me."

He groaned, gripped her shoulders and crushed his lips down against her mouth. They kissed wildly, began pulling at each other's clothes. Lusiel heard something rip, looked down as Quinn bared her breasts and lowered his mouth to take her nipple between his teeth. She held the back of his head, running her fingers through his hair and holding him to her.

She tossed her head back, laughed out loud to the ceiling. She exhulted at the thrill coursing through her, the enjoyment of touching him, feeling him touch her. She was alive, and she had him against her again, felt his warm mouth moving on her.

He lifted her, his arms clasping her under her rear so that he didn't lose his hold on her breast as he moved her to the bed. He laid her down, there, reaching to yank off the rest of her clothes. She heard more ripping. He didn’t smile as he stood there next to the bed, looking down at her. He only pulled his shirt over his head, kicked off his boots and pushed his pants down his lean legs, looking at her throughout. She grinned, crooked a finger at him invitingly and spreading her legs in front of him. Quinn groaned, his eyes darkening to blue-black brilliance.

Naked, he reached for her. But Lusiel shook her head, gripping his hands to pull him towards her. She spun him until he lay on his back, straddled his hips and reached down to yank his hands onto her breasts. He fondled her nipples, pulling them smoothly. Then he moaned, "Put me inside you now." She smiled, reaching behind her to grip his erection. She rubbed him, smoothing the skin over his hardness. "Lusiel!"

Lusiel laughed briefly as she raised herself up, placing him against her before beginning to slide down onto him. He arched under her, groaning as he felt himself engulfed. He reached down to grip her hips, held her in place on him, luxuriating in the warmth of her.

"I almost lost you," he whispered.

"I'm right here, Malavai," she promised him.

Then she started moving. She rode him, sliding her hips up and down over him. She raised herself up until he almost came free of her, then dropped herself back down. She repeated the motion over and over. Celebrating, living! As he came apart beneath her, groaning at the feel of her. He lost control, using his hold on her waist to move her on him, hard. Then harder. He pushed himself up into her, twisting his pelvis against her clit, watched her face as the pleasure bloomed and she cried out his name, coming wildly. Feeling her tighten around him so incredibly was enough. Quinn moaned, threw his head back against the bed, and spent himself inside of her.

Lusiel collapsed onto his chest, and Quinn held her there. They both panted madly, their bodies glistening with sweat. He smoothed his hand up and down along her spine, felt himself drifting into sleep. He wrapped his arms around her and closed his eyes, “Lusiel.” Lusiel listened to his heartbeat settling. She yawned.

She should let her brother know his algorithms weren't effective against her husband's decryptions. Perhaps.


	79. Heading into the Prisons

Pierce was apprehensive. He'd been gratified when Lord Lusiel supported his efforts to reconstitute his old team. He needed each one of the men, before he could assault the Republic’s base of operations on Corellia. That one they called the Bastion. Then Pierce discovered that several of his men were imprisoned here on Belsavis.

Figures, too. Brun Jakir was the team's medic, and a damn good officer. And Lion Cole worked the team's communications. Both men were captured on Coruscant. Apparently a bunch of Sith were secretly working to uncover fine Jedi artifacts in that busted up Temple of theirs on the planet. The Republic really shoulda killed them, Pierce thought. But that was their own stupid mistake. Instead they dumped his men on Belsavis, along with several other soldiers captured with them on the Republic home world.

Probably no clue how dangerous the guys could be, he decided.

Pierce thought Belsavis was a right pretty world, actually. The trees here in these warm cavernous pockets dug out of the ground by weird-ass volcanoes were huge towering structures. He'd seen some soldiers actually camping on top of the roots of several fucking huge specimens, even. If it weren't for the raving lunatics fighting each other around every corner – oh, and the walls that seemed to impede your progress every single blasted time you tried moving an inch forward – well, then Belsavis might be considered a true jewel of a planet.

For now, he just trotted to catch up to his little Sith.

Lord Lusiel was arguing with what looked to be an enterprising quartermaster type who was selling various weapons in front of the Imperial command post when Pierce stepped up behind her. The captain was next to her, of course, while Vette and Jaesa sat nearby, calmly watching the vehement shouting match that Lusiel seemed to be enjoying.

That was another thing Pierce didn't understand about the Sith Lord he was serving, too. She had monies enough. She certainly had a cruel and vicious authority. She could outright buy anything she wanted. Or just take it. What sort of vendor anywhere in the Empire would seriously refuse her? Yet Lusiel engaged countless shop owners in these exchanges, almost all of which devolved into bickering. Jaesa told him the arguments amused Lusiel. It just confused Pierce, though.

"This is obviously a Sith shield device! Do you see the markings on these modifications, here? If someone isn't careful, such a device would do them serious harm. The entire thing reeks of the Dark Side, after all. I would think you’d want to be rid of it! Are you already driven insane by the thing?" Lusiel shook her head sadly at the human behind the counter.

"Not easy to come by a piece of genuine Sithy equipment, now is it?" The vendor shot back at her, his narrow weasel-like face pinched.

"Sithy? Is that even a word?"

"It is in my book. You going to buy the thing, or not?"

"Oh, no. I was rather hoping you might sell it to someone else, so that I could watch them try to use it. The sheer catastrophe would be highly entertaining."

The vendor snorted at her as Lusiel chuckled. He gaped when she started to turn away, groaning as his potential sale started to disappear. “Fine then! Hundred fifty credits! Quick, before someone sees how much a cheapskate I can be …” Lusiel narrowed her eyes and watched the man blanch. But Quinn smoothly transferred the credits and she only snatched the device out of the vendor’s greedy hands.

Pierce clutched his datapad carefully as Lord Lusiel turned and saw him standing there, unwilling to say anything in front of the vendor. Not too much willing to say anything when Lusiel was already more pissed than not, actually. Pierce swallowed slowly as she nodded towards the wall where Vette and Jaesa were sitting. Quinn was frowning at him as they all gathered together.

"I sincerely hope you don't have more studies about Sith and non-Sith relationships to share with us, lieutenant," Quinn said, his eyes hard as he regarded the datapad Pierce was holding.

Lusiel looked at him, obviously confused, "What sort of studies?"

Shit, Quinn would ruin it by describing the stupidity of that old insult now, Pierce thought. He was surprised Lusiel hadn't heard of it already, actually. Why hadn’t Quinn mentioned it to her before? Pierce almost growled in frustration as he waited for Quinn's bombshell. But the captain merely shrugged, "It's not important, my lord. Believe me."

Lusiel regarded him for a moment. She obviously didn’t believe him. But in the end, she just shrugged, "Very well. What is it, lieutenant?"

Pierce took a deep breath, relieved, as he raised the datapad and began describing the situation. From the records he’d managed to glean after arriving on Belsavis, Jakir and Cole had succeeded in putting together a pretty nifty defensive position once the prison planet went to Hell and the rioting began. Not surprising, that. They were damned good soldiers, he told Lusiel.

But their position was currently being assaulted by Republic forces. Even some sort of mercenary hires were involved, as Pierce had heard some smuggler captain and his crew were going at it, as well. It wouldn't be long before the Imperials were overrun and recaptured.

"What sort of defenses have they managed to put together?" Quinn had canted his head as he considered the information on the pad, almost leaning sideways to better see the information.

"Aside from the physical fortifications and the fodder of men they've recruited from the cells, it seems they've also put together a pretty impressive force field around the encampment. I expected that much at least, mind you. Jakir is a doctor-type but he's pretty handy with tech, too." Pierce lifted his chin up. He sounded proud.

"It seems our medics have to be multi-talented," Lusiel said, nudging Quinn with one of her small elbows briefly.

Quinn grunted softly, nodding at the datapad. "You'll have to disable the field just to get in there long enough to address your men. That will leave all of them vulnerable to the Republic in the meantime."

"We only have to get Jakir and Cole, plus whatever small group they've managed to keep alive through this mess. The rest of 'em can hold off the Republic long enough, I'm thinking." That the prisoners left to fight the Republic afterward would be sacrificed went without saying. In Pierce’s mind, his men took priority over the lot of prisoners on this planet. It was pretty enough, at least.

"It's not a bad plan, my lord. It depends mostly on Pierce's brute skill. But with the proper technical expertise, he could easily succeed," Quinn pointed to the schematics describing the generators the Imperials had coopted to work their force field.

Lusiel was quiet as she leaned over to read through the data. She raised a brow towards Quinn, finally. "You're the only one I'd trust to adequately penetrate a field like this, captain."

"Me? My lord, we're moving deeper into Belsavis once we have the information we need to find Darth Ekkage's location from the records room where it's being stored," Quinn shook his head at her.

"Jaesa can accompany me to retrieve the records, bring down Ekkage. But if we can simultaneously provide for the Empire to better succeed in its endeavors on Corellia, don't you think we should?" Lusiel knew Quinn was still smarting from Quesh. She watched him struggle, now. He frowned towards Jaesa, who stared back at him with her strange yellow eyes.

"Well, my lord. If the captain is unable to succeed at the mission, maybe we should just find someone else." Pierce held his hands up in mock surrender when both Lusiel and Quinn turned and glared at him. He didn’t smile even a little bit.


	80. Playing with the Jedi

They taunted him through the door. They told him Melicost had what he needed to find the Darth, that he would free her and then leave Belsavis. They mocked him, “You’ll die in there, Jedi. Like a raving animal … you might last a while, though. Wonder how long you’ll be in there, starving.” He watched the inside panels of the door as they went along, “Hey, maybe we’ll stick around long enough to hear you begging us to get you out of there.”

He only smiled as he listened to them, gazing about the room with its myriad computers blinking at him. He did not fear death, nor pain really. The Force would sustain his spirit, regardless. He was Jedi and he was at peace. He knelt down by the door and meditated, rather.

The first sign of disturbance reached him sooner than he might have imagined, and he cocked his head sideways as he considered the feeling of her approach through the Force. He heard the distant calls of distress then, listened. The sound became louder, as she came closer. She was dark and compelling, destructive and fierce. She was so _fierce_!

Jedi Master Somminick Timms rose up to face the door, attentive. He knew her, sorrowed at her familiarity. She had shattered his old master, destroyed Nomen Karr. Feeling Karr break into pieces was devastating, and Timms writhed through the bond they had shared together, called out to him and lost him anyway. He mourned him even today. That, and the loss of Master Karr’s young padawan, too. Had the Sith destroyed young Jaesa, too? Was she gone?

So now he would face the same dark that ruined Master Karr. Timms wondered at the subtle ironies of the Force, the meanings implicit in such seemingly random meetings. He refused to lose himself to fear, sank into his own balance, his own peace. He prepared himself.

The screams of the dying Imperials ached through the door. He listened to them calling out for mercy, “No, my lord! Please!” Timms shook his head at the sheer waste of the exercise. The Sith seemed inclined to such destructive infighting, killing themselves and each other as much as they battled the Republic. It was beyond him the Empire found value in such profligate endeavors, constantly clashing for outright supremacy. As if they would ever manage to succeed on their own, all alone in the end.

For now, though, he waited. He listened as the Sith cleared the rooms out there of Melicost's commandoes. The screams tapered off into silence, deathly quiet. But Timms knew she was there, could feel her like a terrible presence just on the other side of the door. Her strength was a compelling thing, almost beautiful in a way. Master Karr had been unwise enough to bash himself up against it, Timms thought. He should have found another way.

Then she banged on the door. Knocking, like she was calmly seeking admittance into someone’s home. Timms chuckled when she kicked it in some sort of frustration next, heard her say to someone else with laughter in her tone, "They didn't _seem_ smart enough to know I was coming. How'd they know to bar the door?"

Humor. _That_ was what laced the darkness of her personality, that smoothed the edges of anger and rage that was so much her sense. So much close to her now, Timms was fascinated as he regarded the full feeling of her personality. Before, he had only managed an understanding of the shadows and the blackness of her spirit, lost in Master Karr’s angry combat with her. Maybe it was Master Karr’s own bitterness that really shaped so much of Timms’ perceptions of that event, too. Because there was so much more to this Sith.

She laughed.

She feared, too.

Oh, and she loved.

She cared for the person she was addressing, in fact.

And others, besides. Some men, a small twi’lek who giggled, and a brother. _Especially_ the brother. And her husband, just as much. She loved him very, very much.

Then she sensed him moving across her mind and vivid, powerful barriers flew up and into place.  Quickly, suddenly and with the most stunningly impressive strength.  _Jedi_ , she snarled back at him.  She _saw_ him just as truly.

How fascinating. Timms had always imagined Sith were monstrous, horrid creatures that mindlessly destroyed, wreaked havoc. But this Sith impressed him with the ultimate understanding, that they were people. With all a people's feelings and faults. Dark, yes. But by their own choice and belief and through their own action. There was nothing inherent or intrinsic to their evil. Perhaps they might even be changed, brought back to the light. For what is the true nature of mankind? Good or evil?

An interesting concept he would have to ponder at some length, Timms decided.

In the meantime, he decided to introduce himself, and he did, calling to the Sith through the entry. He waited, biting back his smile as she joked with him in return, "Well. This just isn't your day, Jedi. Is it? I need to get into that room. And you're in my way."

What an amusing conversation, Timms thought. “Indeed, I know who you are. You … introduced yourself to my master, Nomen Karr. I know what you did to him, I felt it.” The memory of the pain skittered through him, and he leaned his head down. But her disgust arched at him.

"Your Master died like a raging dog, maddened and out of his mind."

Timms didn't become angry. She was truly disgusted Nomen Karr weakened and fell, would’ve respected him if he died with his head held up. She might even had said so, he thought suddenly. It surprised him. "He did fall into the dark. It was hard to believe such a strong Jedi would succumb, although I felt it happen." Timms licked his lips, patted the inner door panel as if to share his certainty, "The Jedi Council has kept its sights on you ever since, you know. We know you’ve broken with Darth Baras. He tried to kill you on Quesh, right? The Republic sent soldiers.”

She laughed sourly, “The Jedi fight for Baras now? I had no idea his fat fingers had sunk into so many pies.” Timms frowned, “The soldiers were to save you!”

“Is that so? They were the ones who set the explosives, Jedi.” She shuddered through the Force, her anger a brilliant thing suddenly. Timms quailed back from it, almost overwhelmed by its intensity. She snarled through the door, “My husband nearly died!”

Timms settled backwards, easing himself down onto his heels as he studied the door. He waited for her to regain a sense of calm control again, admired her ability to do so much. He had not thought Sith aspired to control, anyway. “You’re here to stop Baras from freeing Darth Ekkage, his sister.”

"Baras may be my enemy but I am still Sith. I serve the Emperor himself. Do not doubt me."

That news was disconcerting. Timms was aware that Baras was newly made a Dark Council member. Sith politics were brutal and unforgiving; this Sith before him actually killed Baras’ master to win him the seat. Now she fought to keep her own head. Brutal and unforging … of course she would need a new, stronger and more powerful master.

Timms bantered with her, "Oh, I wouldn't dream of doubting you. And yet here we both are, stuck on opposite sides of this door. It seems we really do need to work together for the moment, as uncomfortable as the proposition may seem." He breathed out slowly. Timms truly believed that incredible things could start from the first smallest steps.

He heard her laughing at him, "You were trapped in there by these mere soldiers?"

"Oh, I don't know. There were quite a lot of them. I held my own. _I'm_ still alive."

She laughed again. Like she couldn’t help herself, like she was only inveterate and free. And so much young. He thought her laughter quite pleasant, actually. "I think I actually like you, Jedi. So what do you need? I really do have to get into that room."

Timms explained that their combined force blows could break the physical seal on the door, compel it open. "However, there's a failsafe force field that would engage if we did that. You must destroy the generators outside before we strike, in order to prevent the field from engaging."

He heard a muffled laugh coming from whoever had accompanied the Sith. Then the Sith responded to her companion, a sideways commentary he didn’t truly understand. "Yes, well. He’s still better served assisting Pierce with his little adventure. They may require more sophisticated measures against _that_ force field, at least. We're just going to smash things. Far easier." Timms only shrugged with bemusement as he listened to her.

"Well, Sith?" He asked her.

"Sit tight, Jedi. I'll be back."

"Oh, I'm not going anywhere. Believe me."

He heard the Sith laugh again as she began moving away. Timms glanced around the room, looked at the computers all along the walls. He activated his lightaber and moved swiftly. Unlike Karr, Timms understood he needed a degree of logical balance to merit him time enough against her, rather than relying on strength. At least to finish his task here on Belsavis. When he was ready, he settled himself patiently against the floor alongside the door and waited.

Not that it took her long. She even kicked the door again once she returned. This time, Timms laughed. Which she echoed on the other side of the door. She was playing with him, and Timms found the game fun and engaging. The irony of such feelings, the understanding he was enjoying himself playing games and winning motions with a Sith Lord – it was strange and new. And good. He liked it. "Are you ready, then, Sith? We should be able to force the door open now. On three. One … Two … Three!"

Timms pressed against the door with all the force power he could, pushing it like it was a mighty wrecking ball. Like it was weight and might and focused. He felt it meet with a corresponding force, the two clashing, holding and pressing against each other. Timms felt the pressure build up between them, surging, rising. Until, finally, the energy contracted, bubbled, burst. There was a mighty explosion of sound and smoke as the door shattered in on itself, crumbling under the weight of their separate efforts.

Timms coughed as gas and smoke obscured his vision for some moments. He saw the seemly shape of a female through the burning smoke of the door's debris, blinked at her as she took shape. She was smaller than he'd imagined, actually. She only came up to his shoulders! That such strength could emanate from such a little lady was a testament of the Force’s power.

Then he saw her face. Timms took a step back, momentarily shocked. For one instant, he disconcertedly wondered if she'd actually failed to escape the Emperor's control or was still secretly serving him. Had she fooled them all? Then he noticed the small differences in key features – the shape of the brow, the bloom of color on this one's lips, the subtle tilt of her chin. This Sith was older, too. Only barely.

This development was … troubling. Although not that extraordinary, either. As he recalled, she'd come to the Jedi when she was still only a youngster, and even then she was removed from much of the Order as she healed and trained. It wasn't as if her origins, or her parentage, were absolutely certain things. This Sith was only a relative of hers, somehow. It was imperative he discuss this with Master Satele, Timms thought.

Then he noticed the Sith's companion. Beneficial, that. He was able to secret his shock at the Sith's appearance by concentrating on _Jaesa_. The girl stood behind and to the side of the Sith, covered in a robe that bared her midriff tantalizingly, invitingly, while her eyes gleamed golden at him with pure malice.

The Sith still shot him a suspicious glance. She _knew_ he was hiding something. Hopefully he would be able to hide it from her through to the end. Perhaps she'd kill him and the truth would remain out of her sight. But then the Council wouldn't learn the truth, either. How frustrating, he decided. "Wait a moment … you're Jaesa Willsaam, aren't you?" Timms leaned sideways to better look towards Jaesa.

"I used to be," she responded, wryly.

He felt his heart break as he regarded her. _So lost_ , he thought. "Hello, Jaesa. You’ve been missed, young one." But Jaesa only laughed, “I bet I am. You don’t get to use me so easily anymore. It’s gotta suck, huh?”

Timms shook his head, “The Sith are …”

“They’re honest! They don’t sing to me how fucking noble they are, just admit straight out what they want or need. I know where I stand and I can choose for my own damn self!” Jaesa clenched her fists tightly, before stepping closer to her master and breathing in slow breaths. And the Sith _was_ her master, Timms saw. She turned her dark head to nod smoothly in approval of Jaesa’s comments. And her ultimate control, too.

Timms shook his head at them, "Yes, I can see you're two peas in a pod."

Jaesa shuddered, "I hate peas."

The Sith chuckled. What was her name, he wondered suddenly, trying to remember. Instead, he gestured towards the computer room. "So before we all start fighting and as delightful as that would be, there's something you should see, Sith." Timms cocked his head as he leaned inside the door to regard the ruined computer banks, the slash marks of his lightsaber glaringly obvious all around the room. He tsked, "Wow, they're all destroyed. I wonder who could've done such a thing?"

She laughed outloud, "How is it that Nomen Karr could've produced two such delightful and capable force users, when he himself was so deficient?" Timms ignored the subtle insult to his old master, just grinned at her for the infectiousness of her laughter. He wondered how the Empire could have produced such a beautiful creature from out of so much anger and fear and hate, actually. But _he_ didn’t ask.

"Now I'm the only one who knows where to go. Our goals are the same, even if our motives vary. I suggest a partnership."

"I agree," The Sith nodded. "We’ll stow our disagreements for now. Once the deed’s done, we’re enemies again. And you’ll need to run those pretty green legs of yours fast to get out of my way then!”

"So no victory celebration?" Timms shrugged at her, pretendingly imploring. The Sith smiled at him, shook her head. He sighed, "That’s too bad, really.” He gave her the directions to where Ekkage’s assassins were in the process of being freed. He knew she would stop them from joining Darth Ekkage, didn’t ask her how she would accomplish the feat. He leaned back on the heels of his boots, eyed her curiously, “What do you call yourself? I’d rather refer to you by name, than continue thinking of you as ‘the dark Sith who destroyed my master’, please.”

She narrowed her eyes. Timms inhaled sharply as he realized how much like her sister’s those eyes really were. “Lusiel. I’m Lord Lusiel Quinn.” Then she shrugged, “Or you can call me Wrath. I do believe that’s what the Emperor wants me called now.”

Timms only blinked at her.


	81. Stay off our ship!

Vette rolled her eyes at the idiot. Not that he was stupid enough to take a step closer just yet. He sort of hovered down at the edge of the Wing’s ramp, his eyes glued to her blasters where they were raised up to point down at his face. But if he actually thought the rusty shiv he was waving around was at all intimidating her, he really was a complete and total idiot and she felt safe enough using the word. Because it applied, dangit!

"You know, this ship belongs to a Sith Lord. Not some little wannabe badass flunky of the Empire. I'm talking a genuine Sith will-pull-yer-bleeding-heart-from-your-chest Lord. Do you honestly want to play this game with me?" She shook her lekku at him, watching his eyes the whole while.

"Shut up, ya little blue slut. We wanna get off this hunk of rock and yer standing in the way," he actually spit as he ranted at her. Through apparently rotting teeth, mind you. Things were all yellow and chipped and broken. Vette was disgusted. She watched him, saw him baring those broken choppers as threateningly as he could at her. She lifted her blasters a tad bit higher, “You might want to keep the last teeth you have, actually.”

He was a grimy specimen of human male. His hair was lank and unwashed, stringy, falling to his shoulders. He was garbed in one of the soiled yellow jumpsuits she'd seen all the prisoners on the planet wearing. But _his_ jumpsuit looked nearly brown, it was so grungy. And he smelled. Like rotten Orokeet eggs, no less.

None of which would bother Vette so much, if it wasn't that the filthy shit-for-brains human was actually accompanied by a ring of similarly muck-ridden chums. What fucking rock did they crawl out from under, she wondered.

There were a grand total of five of the bastards fighting to get onto Lusiel's ship. She could see a couple of Zabracks, one Rattataki, and two humans, including the erstwhile leader of the group who continued barking at her while waving his tarnished blade around. He was probably leading because the shiv was the deadliest weapon in the group. The rest carried clubs made from the wood of one those giant trees outside the spaceport.

And they were all smelly enough that Vette felt nauseated just standing there in front of them. She refused to glance away towards the doors of the hangar, but she did wonder where all the stupid Imperials had disappeared off to. What sort of idiots let a bunch of brainless prisoners storm their way into the Imperial spaceport's ship hangars with nothing but clubs arming them? Lusiel was going to have a regular Nerf-ridden tantrum when she heard about this debacle!

"Look, I'm only going to say this one more time. Because I figure even fools should have a small chance to run for it before they start dying.” Vette deliberately spoke slowly. Maybe the words would actually sink into their puny brains! “This ship belongs to a Sith Lord. And she's not interested in hosting you on board. Trust me. She hates smelly people. So you need to turn yourselves around, go outside and tell the nice Imperials we chatted, and have a good friggin' I'm-lucky-to-be-alive day." Vette gestured with her blasters as she spoke. All in all, she thought it was a pretty nice speech.

"And I say we're not willing to stay on Belsavis a moment longer. So we're going to get on that ship, with you, and take you far away, where you can spend countless hours helping us make up for the years we've been stuck here without any damn women to feast our eyes on." This time the Rattataki growled at her. Seriously growled. She wondered if he'd actually devolved in the years he'd been on Belsavis. She eyed him, narrowly. Possible, she decided.

She began counting their steps forward, trying to determine which one would be first to reach the ramp. She thought at first it would be the human with the knife. But no. It was the gray-skinned Rattataki. He placed his foot on the very edge of the ramp and made to push himself forward, grinning as he watched her hesitate to pull the triggers on her blasters.

He didn't realize what it is she was waiting for, though. It simply never occurred to him she didn't want to accidently shoot Broonmark.

The Talz made his presence known, finally, when his vibrosword swung out, catching the Rattataki in the chest and bodily lifting him so that he sailed through the air to land with a huff against a nearby cargo container. The other men began screaming out as the beastly Talz followed through on his momentum, lopping off the head of the poor human carrying a club and then shooting one of his electronic shocks at a Zabrack. He jumped through the air then, landing on the twitching Zabrack with a warbling yell of triumph, where he began clawing and ripping at the fellow with his bare claws.

Vette fired her blasters at the shiv-carrying asshole, then. She watched a series of holes open up in the man's chest as his wide-open toothless mouth screamed in agony. The other Zabrack made to run at Broonmark's back but Vette spun and aimed, firing her blasters towards that idiot, the shots working to spin him madly in a circle before he fell dead at the back of Broonmark's feet.

Vette eyed the Talz, then. Broonmark was standing up, holding the horns he'd ripped off the head of the Zabrack he'd just finished clawing to death. He marched over to the Rattataki, carrying the horns in his hands. The gray man watched him coming, gasping for breath through his broken ribs. Broonmark laughed down at him as he swung out with the horns, catching the Rattatki squarely on each side of his face, making a loud crunching noise as his blows impacted the man's head and leaving him to grin ghoulishly around the bloody holes in his two cheeks. He screamed and gurgled around the blood, dying quickly.

And then Broonmark whistled in that strange language of his, "Sith clan is stronger! You all die!"

It took Vette several minutes to calm the raging Talz. Eventually, they began cleaning and straightening the area around the ship's ramp. By the time that Pierce and Quinn wearily approached the ship, the bodies of the prisoners were stacked neatly in a row right alongside the ship.

Vette tacked a placard next to the corpses, though. That was her helpful tip of the day, basically. It said, "Seriously: stay away from our Sith Lord's ship."


	82. Kinder than the Last

Quinn found Pierce in the mess, watching a holo presentation of the latest Huttball game as he messily devoured a bantha burger and some hubba chips. The announcer was shouting the game’s progress against the backdrop. Apparently, the Rotworms were winning the game, Quinn saw. Then he flicked a command towards the terminal and the game disappeared.

"Hey!" Pierce turned to glare at him. He looked ready to throw some of his chips at Quinn’s head. Quinn thought it would be unwise to admit he was a Frogdog fan right then.

"Lieutenant, the members of your team that we secured are having issue verifying their identities with the Empire’s transcribers here at base. It’s likely they’ll be set outside the perimeter unless you provide reasonable authentication on their behalfs. Now, mind you.” Quinn stared hard against Pierce’s glare, narrowed his blue eyes, “I really would hate to lose them back to the Republic after expending so much effort to recover them.”

From her vantage at end of the table, Vette chuckled as she watched the two men bristling at each other. To her, they looked like nothing more than a pair of nerf bulls itching to charge at each other and pawing against the floor, even. She looked around the mess, judging it for necessary space. But as amusing as she thought it might be, there really was nowhere in the immediate vicinity the two men could go at it.

Even if watching them roll around and hammer against each other would be as thrilling to watch as any Huttball game. But Vette was still smarting that she’d missed the chance to see if the one player’s tremendous leap onto the upper ledge of the zone managed to net the Rotworms a score, damn it.

Still. Vette waved one of her hands into the fray, "Whoah, there, guys. Careful we don't ruin the table, okay?" She grinned when they both shot her deadly glances. "Ouch. So yea, I suck as a peacemaker. How bout if I threaten you guys with a Talz if you don’t chill out?"

Quinn returned his attention to Pierce, admonished, "You have responsibilities, lieutenant. See to them."

Pierce almost threw what was left of his burger at the captain's back as Quinn deliberately marched back out of the mess. "The man's a damn robot. I doubt he cares squat for anything as much as he does his precious 'duties'. Burns me up." He snorted, even as he grabbed a last bite of his sandwich and prepared to leave.

Vette shrugged. She gathered dishes together, to hand off to Toovee. So she wasn’t looking at Pierce as she remarked sideways, "He's pretty nervous actually. He's not used to being left behind while Lord Lusiel's on a mission."

"Nah! Have you even looked at him? Like a droid!"

She shook her head at him. "No, he just doesn't think the way you do. His brain functions more like a datapad. He only pulls out those files he can actually handle thinking about and keeps everything else listed out of sight.” She hummed, “No, right now he's totally focused on the file called ‘W’ for work. So that he can function."

Pierce stared at her. Not for the first time, Pierce considered how much the slaves of the Empire really noticed when they were going about their tasks. It did give him pause enough, to consider that if he ever wanted to know something pertinent about an enemy or an opponent, talking to the git’s slaves might be the best way to go about it. Aloud though, Pierce just wondered, "What about one labeled 'M' for marriage?"

"That isn't the one he's having a hard time with at the moment. More like 'L' for Lusiel, rather. That's the one he's hiding from.” She shrugged, “This isn’t about him, anyway. He’s not half as worried about what might happen to _him_. You know, like some _normal_ Imperial might be. Nope, he’s going nuts worrying if she’s eating right, if she’s cold or her head hurts, if she’s comfortable …” Vette laughed as she held up her hands and waved her fingers in the air.

Pierce gaped at her. "I can't see him like that."

"Of course you don't. Your mind is more like a friggin' hammer. Everything is blunt and aggressive and just right there, front and center and pretty much all the time.” She bent her head sideways, considering him, “I bet you're not even worried about Jaesa, are you?"

"Makes more sense to be worried about whatever sorry ass happens to get in her way, actually."

"Yea, but you never saw Jaesa floating in a kolto tank after carrying her out of a cave that almost collapsed on top of her head, either." Vette shrugged slowly, “Even the stick up his butt doesn’t detract from how much you end up liking Quinn. Weird, huh?  Hey, want to help me find Toovee a new set of pants?  I was thinking ... teal.”

Pierce frowned at the twi'lek. Damn the girl, he thought. She always left him thinking hard enough his head hurt.

* * *

Lusiel sighed heavily as she regarded the armored commandoes working so fast to disable the locks on the cell doors that imprisoned Ekkage’s Sith assassins. Beside her, Jaesa grinned broadly, “Well. It would hardly be so much fun if we didn’t have to contend with the Sith and then soldiers besides, too.”

"And that's what I live to provide for you, Jaesa. Loads of fun."

"Oh, I'm grateful, believe me."

Lusiel kept it at joking banter, rather than acknowledge the edge of truth lining Jaesa’s sentiments. She only smiled drily and then waved ahead of her, "Well, let's introduce ourselves, shall we?"

The two women stepped boldly into the cell’s entrance. There were three Sith, only just awakened from stasis and reeling slightly, angry and hate-filled as they looked over at Lusiel and Jaesa with sour expressions. The soldiers gaped, their squad leader barking aloud, “Women! Don’t come any closer! Leave now!” One narrow-chested Sith turned his head, snorting at the man, “You’ve already proved how simple you are, that your rescue was sniffed out by those hostile to our master. Don’t compound your stupidity now, judging our enemies by their mere shape. Their power is potent."

The soldier got a frantic look on his face, "We're prepared to defend you, my lord." But the Sith waved his hand, appearing bored.

"Shut up. You don’t even know the risk you invite with every single breath out of your stupid mouth,” the Sith reached out to grasp the shoulder of the second, even slighter-framed Sith next to him. He helped the man to remain standing, before glancing towards Lusiel as he lifted his chin, “I’ll hear what you have to say, at least. But I’ll defend myself, if you press me.” Lusiel studied him carefully. His power was obvious enough, considering he was recovering so quickly only moments from being released. But he was still weak enough he couldn’t hide his real anxiety, and all of it was focused on the small man next to him. That one was much lesser, stood there practically leaning against his stronger friend with his head bent over as he breathed in steady, methodically precise puffs of air.

The two of them still _matched_ together. “You’re not brothers.” Lusiel narrowed her eyes as the Sith stiffened protectively, “You’ll defend your lover, more like.”

“And so you’ve proved your discernment through the Force. I’m duly impressed,” the man yanked his smaller companion behind him and glared over at her. He clenched his hand into a fist against his side, lost within the folds of his gray robes as he restrained the smaller Sith from coming back to face her. “Really, I am. What is it you want, Sith?”

“I want Ekkage dead, of course. Well, her brother really. But I’ll settle for Ekkage in the meantime,” Lusiel stepped sideways, circling towards the edge of the brief cell for more space that Jaesa could use to swing her double-bladed lightsaber if it came to a real fight. The protective Sith followed her motion with a darkening gaze, held up his hand when the soldiers started to lift up their weapons in threat towards her.

“Darth Ekkage commands us. She would not be pleased if we fail her now,” the Sith admitted. Because of course Ekkage was so much like her own brother, the slug. She’d ferreted out this Sith’s truest feelings and then used them to her own advantage, used his affections for a lover to threaten and direct him. Lusiel considered the third Sith, the quiet one who remained hidden under a gray hood as he watched them converse. She could only just make out his bearded chin.

_That_ was the brother, she surmised. It wasn’t even important which of the other two was the sibling, the quiet one would protect them both. A simple, neat trick – three Sith manipulated by nothing so much as their own fondness for each other. She must always be stronger than this, Lusiel thought. _She_ would have killed Ekkage first, after all. Just for the threat alone.

“Ekkage is doomed, though.” Lusiel rolled her shoulders slowly, “I’ve been tasked to destroy her by the Emperor’s own Hand. I am _his_ Wrath.” That announcement was utterly unexpected, struck all three of the Sith like sledges. They all stopped to stare at her for long moments, turned to regard each other carefully, thoughtful.

The soldiers’ commander was scowling, though. He certainly didn’t understand Sith politics, rules or plays at authority. He stayed focused on the truth of his own place, rather, “Darth Ekkage will break every one of you into little pieces if you betray her.” Jaesa smirked at him, “Someone’s going to be broken into little pieces here, at least.”

The assassins decided, then. They straightened into readiness, there in front of Lusiel. And they declared, “We will not stand against the Emperor. We pledge it, pledge ourselves! Our loyalty is his to command and direct, we swear it.”

Lusiel stared at him, at his burning, fierce eyes. The hate there, the anger at Ekkage and all the endless years he was forced to give her. The echo of it that burned inside her own self, and the determination to be more. To finally be freed! Lusiel pointed at him, “Prove it.”

All three of the assassins spun around like a solid unit, unhesitating. The Imperial commando jerked backwards, shouted out one time as he tried raising up his rifle, “No! Don’t!” His weapon was ripped out of his hands, shattered into jagged pieces there in mid-air. He followed, rising up straight and jerking with both hands at some unseen force wrapped around his neck. He kicked futilely, gurgling and swaying as he slowly, slowly died.

The others died faster. Mostly because the small robed figure of the ailing Sith didn’t devote himself to control enough to needle and torment the soldiers. He only waved his hands, holding the remaining soldiers long enough to crack their necks in one single swoop. That was impressive enough, though. If only because he managed the most incredible synchronized ruin of each one of the men, that they each died simultaneously and in the same precise manner. Lusiel frowned, regarded the cowled figure with newly narrow eyes.

If he was capable of such skill even as he swayed under the burden of stasis sickness …

The first Sith, the one who spoke for them – he stepped between Lusiel and his lover, scowling over at her. “We’re finally free of _her_.” Lusiel nodded at him. She felt the same whenever she considered Baras, at least. She shrugged, “Let’s hope our new master is kinder than the last, hmm?”


	83. Breaking her Neck

Lusiel let loose a frustrated huff when she finally saw Lord Melicost.

Was the Force actually some perverse tormenter, determined to drive her mad from frustration? Or maybe there was something about Belsavis in particular. But every time she tried catching an enemy in time enough, it was only just as they were being released from the Republic’s restraints.

Seriously. What possible luck was she lacking, to actually and literally run down these long, yawning corridors just in time to see Melicost greeting Ekkage as she dropped down from the stasis that imprisoned her? Son of a bitch! Lusiel was half tempted to turn around and march back up the course, just to find some more of the strange bovine creatures that argued and fought with her all along the way. What did they call themselves – the Esh’ka, that’s right! Bastard cows!

Ekkage was arguing with Melicost just then, and Lusiel gripped Jaesa’s arm and ducked them both quickly behind one of the looming columns that supported the cavernous prison where the Darth had been held. She noted the computer systems lining the walls, the blinking numbers and lights all around them. The Republic’s security measures had been intense enough. But they’d never imagined Ekkage would be actually released; they dumped her here to be forgotten, to wither and rot away in the dark. Like a moldy piece of trash, Lusiel thought.

Republic notions of honor confounded her, actually. Of course, that’s what kept Ekkage raging about so vibrantly, too. She was practically shouting as she shuddered and shook free of the stasis’ effects, “They thought I would die down here but I was stronger than they even dreamed! I’ll make them pay! Damn you, Melicost, I would make _you_ pay for leaving me here so long. I should!”

“Except that you need me, my lord,” Melicost was a crooning sycophantic weasel of a rat, obviously. He practically oozed towards the Darth, “Your brother sent me just as soon as he could, finally free of Vengean’s insidious control. He’ll be declared the Voice soon enough, and then we’ll all be elevated to unparalleled heights of power and glory!”

“If you think I’m fooled by your absurd drivel, you’re really are more stupid than I ever took you for, Melicost. So just shut up,” Ekkage shivered roughly for a long moment, as she concentrated. Lusiel waited, letting her waste what power she had seeking, seeking. Ekkage whined, “Something’s wrong, damn you! Where are my servants, my own fighters? They were captured with me!”

“I sent soldiers to retrieve your assassins, my lord!”

“But they’re not here, idiot! They’ve … You failed me, Melicost! They’re freed, someone took them from me! Who, damn you! Who did this?” Ekkage started pacing towards Melicost, and Lusiel listened to the sounds of them moving, struggling. There was a brilliant flash of blazing light, the crackle of electricity filled the air … Melicost suddenly flew bodily past them, burning hot from the power of the lightning burning him. He flew so fast, thudded with bone-breaking force into the far wall opposite where Lusiel and Jaesa were standing.

He screamed, his skin burning, burning, melting even! His eyes rolled back against his head and he caught sight of them. His mouth dropped open, he screamed again. And Jaesa … she waved at him just as he finally died.

Ekkage dropped him from her grip then and Melicost fell down onto the floor in a crispy heap of black and red skin and bones. Lusiel shook her head at the broken figure, as Jaesa whispered to her, “So do you think she’ll try eating him, now that he’s all fried and cooked, master?”

“I wouldn’t put it past her, actually. Hunger like that is dangerous to sate,” Lusiel finally slid out from behind the pillar, stepped into Ekkage’s line of sight. She skirted Melicost’s smoking corpse, watching Ekkage as the woman straightened and narrowed her eyes at her.

Darth Ekkage was a degraded, shattered figure. Her skin hung sallow and limp against her face, her dark black eyes sunk deep into her gaunt brow. She looked pretty much like a walking, talking skeleton. Only fatter, Lusiel thought. _Gluttony seemed to run in the family, just as much as betrayal_. Ekkage glared at her, “Who are you?”

Lusiel felt him before she heard him, the sense of his Force strength strangely familiar after meeting him in the records room. That was typical, too. A Jedi who shows up late to the show and then insists he’s the one saving it. And like clockwork, Jedi Master Somminick Timms stepped around the corner of the doorway, asserting, "She's with me, Ekkage."

Lusiel rolled her eyes at him, “Don’t pretend I’m following you, Jedi. This little game of hide and search was mine to win. And I did!” Timms grinned at her, “Are you certain? I was the one pointing the way.”

Ekkage clicked her tongue, dry-sounding. Like someone desperate for a single glass of water. Lusiel considered waving some in front of her, just to watch her pant like a dog. Ekkage croaked, “I see Nomen Karr sent his sad little whelp to find me. Where is he, then?”

Lusiel yawned dramatically, "So slow, Ekkage. If you hadn’t accepted the Republic’s hospitality, you might already know how those of us stronger than you already seized power. Karr is dead.” Lusiel tossed her head, sending a loose bit of her black hair back to brush behind her ear again. Ekkage sneered at her, hate filling her for the sheer vitality in the younger Sith woman, for her ability and her assured attractiveness.

“But you’re here, and depending on a simple Jedi. You’re a fool. And a traitor!”

Lusiel smiled tightly, “Sticks and stones, Ekkage. You and your brother have betrayed the Emperor himself, and he’s rather upset by it. So here I am. Stop trying to change what’s about to happen." Timms frowned, “There’s no need …”

But then Ekkage attacked. Lusiel knew it, saw the woman’s cold, dead eyes flicker briefly with the smallest glimmer of understanding. That maybe, if only she was fast enough, she might save herself. Only there was no chance, not anymore. Lusiel wanted Baras to know first, long before she finally killed him. She wanted him to know what it was to be alone, to fight on his own. She would rip him apart, before she gave him the killing blow at last.

Lusiel was no Melicost, though. As Ekkage’s lightning attack flared out and over the stone floor of the cavernous room, Lusiel was already swinging into the rhythm of her song, lifting her lightsaber in an incredible scarlet chorus as she moved out of the way. It sang out in the muggy air of what amounted to a tomb, there, and Ekkage shrieked madly as she tried trailing Lusiel’s dance with her blazing hands held up in front of her. Lusiel answered her, “What’s wrong? Can’t catch me?” And she laughed!

Lusiel was moving so fast, sinking into the song so wholly she could barely be seen. She flittered back and around, scooting closer and closer to Ekkage as the Darth crouched down to shoot lightning in a single, terrible arch of purple-blue threat. Then Timms flew at her from the side, forcing Ekkage to spin and meet him, yanking her own lightsaber free at the last possible second. Their blades clashed, screaming loudly through the air, and Ekkage yelled at him herself, “I’ll kill you for the last time, Jedi!”

Lusiel yelled, too, "Bah, if anyone kills the Jedi, it will be me, Ekkage!" She leapt towards the battling force users, swinging her lightsaber. Jaesa followed her, her saber spinning in a neat circle of double-bladed crimson rage, wicked and fierce in the battle. Faced with three attackers, Ekkage screamed in frustration. She flung out with lightning again and caught Jaesa against the shoulder before the younger Sith could move out of the way.

Lusiel watched her apprentice slump down onto the ground, crying out against the pain of the burn. Jaesa’s lightsaber clanked against the stone floor as it fell from her suddenly useless fingers.

Ekkage shouted excitedly, raised her lightsaber to destroy the girl. But Lusiel's blade interjected itself, impeding the Darth from even one more threat against Jaesa. Lusiel flung the Force at her, pushed Ekkage off balance so that she stumbled away from the fight. Then she followed her, leaping with a yell and swinging her lightsaber up and over her head. She swung it down against Ekkage in a crashing boom just as her boots hit the ground; heard Ekkage scream again, shrilly this time. Because Lusiel smoothly and horribly crushed her shoulder with that single, awful blow.

Ekkage whimpered, looked blearily up at Lusiel as she wilted back onto her knees there on the floor. Lusiel snarled, “My people follow me, because they know I’ll destroy anyone – anyone! – who threatens them! It’s why Baras will die, too!” Ekkage sniveled, “Please …” But Lusiel was already reaching out with the Force, catching her around the neck. Timms cried out, tried rushing forward. But Lusiel twisted her hand rough and abruptly, sending the Force in a cruel coil around Ekkage’s throat. There was a loud crack as the woman’s neck broke, and then she slumped sloppily over onto the floor.

She turned to check on Jaesa, ignoring Timms’ mournful appraisal of Darth Ekkage’s body there on the cold stone tiles. He was whining, even, "You didn't have to do that, Sith! We might have constrained her again." Lusiel snorted, “As stupid as ever, Jedi. How many times would you want to travel here to Belsavis to keep some fool follower of Baras from freeing her? Or maybe you’d make this tomb your own precious home, just to guard her!”

He turned to look at her, “But you didn’t even consider any other option! This …” Timms waved one of his hands over the dead woman, “This is wrong!”

Lusiel glared at him, even as she patted Jaesa’s shoulder with a cooling cloth from the small medical pack Quinn pressed into her hands before she embarked out from the Imperial base. “See, this is what the order and control the Empire demands actually creates. Sound, stable logic and ultimate security!”

Timms leaned his head to the side as he considered her, “Your former master knows you, Lusiel Quinn. If you depend on the customary order of your ways, he’ll know how to defeat you, then. You must challenge yourself, too!” Lusiel actually angled her chin then, obviously thinking. Timms admired the curve of her face, the intelligence that sparked in her dark eyes. She defied so many of his expectations. She surprised him, and he liked her. “So now what? Do we fight now? Or do we leave here as friends?”

Lusiel jerked her gaze up to look at him. She glared at every line and twist of his Mirialan features, the darkened shadow of black tattoos across his nose and cheeks. And she snarled at him, “You’re as insane as you are stupid! I’m Sith, you’re Jedi! There is no friendship possible between us!”

Timms smiled thinly, “You may want to challenge _that_ notion, too. You may someday find, that a Jedi could be very much your friend. At least.” Timms held up his green hands as he slowly back away from the two Sith females kneeling together on the floor. Then he turned and pattered down the long corridor, heading towards the entrance and the outskirts of the more secure areas of the Republic’s prisons.

Jaesa watched him go, frowning. “It might have been wiser to kill him.”

But Lusiel shrugged, “He was funny enough, though. I’m hard-pressed to destroy anything funny when I find it. I really am.” Jaesa chuckled as Lusiel reached out to pull her up onto her feet again. She grasped the stim that Lusiel held out to her. Lusiel muttered, "Let's go, before Ekkage's body begins cooking as badly as Melicost’s. Wouldn't that be a smelly ending to a perfectly atrocious day?"

* * *

Master Timms hugged the wall outside the cell. He watched the two Sith moving out of the place, heading towards what he knew was an incredibly small outpost manned by a troop of Imperial soldiers. They’d manage to obtain transport there, back to whatever base they were using here on Belsavis.

Lusiel was moving carefully, striving to prevent her apprentice further pain and damage from her injured shoulder. It was profoundly odd, that particular mannerism. A Sith that guarded and protected a weaker figure. Timms frowned, thinking yet again how atypical a Sith Lord Lusiel Quinn truly was, thought he should learn far more about her. Before he was done, at least.

He raised up his commlink, regarded the image that appeared there solemnly. "Master Satele. I have much to report. I will return to Tython immediately."


	84. Breaking Quinn

Lord Draahg remembered his mother well. She'd been a haughty piece of fluff, who impressed upon her son the importance of silently, methodically maneuvering to achieve one's ends. Feelings, affections – such things were immaterial.

That was how she won marriage to a wealthy nobleman on Alderaan, after all. She carefully, coldly ruined the sweetest feelings, the warmest regard that he had for her older sister, whispering in his ear of her supposed cruelties and sullen nature. Until then, he barely noticed her own self. She did manage to revenge her sister, too; years of marriage earned her husband a cold bed and enough cruelties to more than recompense her sister for his weak-willed gullibility.

She had found it all highly amusing. The titillating story of how she prevailed over her lovely, timid, and polite mouse of a sister - who, mind you, spent endless years afterwards crying for her so-called "lost love" – taught Draahg the absolute value of appearing otherwise than one seemed, to blend in and disappear, long enough to maliciously and meticulously ruin one's opponents. The lesson carried him well through his years on Korriban, when his fellows one by one fell to the cruel machinations of their overseer, until at last they were all gone and he himself was alone successful. First, weed out the competition, Draahg believed.

It had always worked to propel Draahg forward, and he held true to the understanding. That is, until the day he laid eyes on the Imperial husband of the Sith he'd thought destroyed. Hell, he'd thought the man – Quinn, right? That was his name, and why did he keep forgetting it? - he'd thought Quinn was dead, too. Buried under loads of flaming rocks and debris back on Quesh, along with his bold and compelling Sith wife.

Not that he'd agreed with Baras they should kill them from such a distance, either. No, he'd been prepared to confront them openly, kill them directly. She didn't understand his real strength, Draahg insisted to Darth Baras. She would never expect such a battle, _never_ be prepared for it. But Baras demanded he remain out of sight, strike at the warrior from a distance. “You persist in seeing her, as every one of her enemies has thought. It is … unwise,” Baras admonished him sharply.

Now Draahg was standing nearby the hangar bay doors with the air freezing frostily around his huffed breaths, as he watched Quinn negotiating with a food seller for replenishment of stores for a Sith Lord's ship. Right there on Hoth. Implausible as he might have imagined, it seemed the attack on Quesh failed. Because the man couldn't have survived the attack unless Lord Lusiel herself clawed her way out of that hole, dragging him behind her. Of course _she_ would expend so much blasted effort to save some damned Imperial, pitiful female that she was.

Draahg's ability to go unnoticed served him well, however. Quinn never saw him, only watched some minor troop lead by a bounty hunter stomp through the hangars. Perfect, thought Draahg, as he adjusted his commlink signal. "My lord? I'm afraid your plan to destroy Lord Lusiel failed. She's alive. And she's on Hoth. What would you have me do?"

* * *

"Ahh, Quinn, you're waking up. How delightful."

Quinn blinked up at the fuzzy image of Darth Baras on the holoterminal. Was there something wrong with the holo, he wondered, confused. No, he realized. It was his vision that was smarting, rather. He was, in fact, kneeling amidst some splattered blood left on the floor when Draahg butted him across the nose with the hilt of his lightsaber. Quinn sneezed more blood onto the floor as he listened to Broonmark's yelps coming from the cargo hold. He yanked against the bonds holding his arms behind his back but the ties remained secure.

"It seems my old apprentice's crew is putting up quite a fight. Draahg may be delayed for several moments, giving us a chance to talk. You should be pleased, Quinn. I would much rather you remain alive, anyway. Your usefulness remains certain," Baras crooned down at him.

Quinn tried wiping his face against his sleeve but only succeeded in smeering even more blood all over himself. He finally gave up the effort to look more presentable, just looked back up at the holo. He kept his expression impassive. "What is it you seek from me, my lord?"

"See? You've always been so much smarter than any other servant of mine, Quinn. I've long valued you," Darth Baras leaned forward, his metallic gaze undeniable. "You know what I need you to do, even without me saying the words. But I'll say them, nonetheless. Only because I want no misunderstandings between us, _captain_." Reminding him of the debt, of his rank and his position. That Quinn was saved, his career was saved only because Baras allowed it after Broysc would have destroyed it all.

Quinn shook his head, sniffed back another breath saturated with his own blood. He coughed, "Lord Draahg must have hit me too hard, my lord. I don't understand." He didn’t lace even his tone with any sort of apology. It was all he could do to keep from snapping and snarling at the man.

The pain helped that much, at least.

Baras laughed. "Draahg doesn't realize your value. That, and he's still miffed my apprentice married you before he could. Envy like that is a hallmark of the young ... It was all I could to keep him from killing you outright."

Quinn lowered his chin, trying to obscure the thrill of anger that went through him at the thought of Lusiel anywhere near, or worse _under_ , the filthy slime of a Sith bastard like Draahg. Baras laughed again, "I see you are not above such possessive qualities, yourself, Quinn. You’ve managed to surprise me so many times where she’s concerned, mind you."

The Darth concluded his needling at last. Quinn was grateful for that much, that Baras was at least getting to the point, rather than meandering through varied and false pretensions of pleasing regard.

"You're going to kill Lord Lusiel for me, Quinn."

Quinn couldn't help it. He jerked his head up again to stare up at Baras in astonishment. Then he actually burst out into a laugh, ignoring the smarting of pain in his head, "You've gone mad, my lord."

"Oh, I know the truth, Quinn. Not like Draahg, who assumes it was Lord Lusiel that dragged you both free of that explosion. I know it was you, though! She trusts you, will let you close enough, will follow you into every one of the Hells itself. No, you can succeed where Draahg will fail. I only know it."

Quinn glared at him, "She's my _wife_."

"Please, Quinn. Don't pretend that sentiment has kept any Imperial from killing a stubborn or recalcitrant spouse many times over.” Baras leaned over the terminal, his hands braced in front of him, “I can make you a Moff, man! Think what we can achieve together, how much we can do for the Empire! With me on the Dark Council, the Voice of the Emperor, and you leading our fleets, we can finally defeat the Republic once and for all!" Darth Baras intoned, determined. Like he was giving a speech in front of the Councils lords, maybe.

Quinn wondered if Baras had finally fooled himself as much as he worked to fool everyone else around him. Therein lay the hazards of building one's life amidst endless deceit. After a time, it was hard to discern where the lies started and ended. He snorted, splashing another splotch of blood on the base of the terminal in front of him.

"I will not," Quinn stared straight ahead, expressionless. He ignored Baras' sputtering.

"You are not such a fool, Quinn. I refuse to believe it!"

Quinn turned to regard the Darth once again, his gaze hard and firm. He did snarl at the Darth, then, "You tried to kill her. You made her bleed. I despise you! I will work with all I am to help her destroy you. Do you hear me?"

Baras chuckled meanly, "And what do you think she will do if I told her how much you'd helped me these past months? All the insights you provided me? If she knew you'd always been mine, _my_ man, my spy on that ship, Quinn! You've seen her go after my moles, ruin and destroy them time and again. She'll kill you!"

Quinn shrugged. "I don't care, damn you. I’d rather die by her hand than raise mine against her."

Baras was stunned. This simply wasn't a development he'd anticipated. No one had ever truly resisted his manipulations. Certainly not a mere Force-blind military man! That's when Baras became truly angry at Quinn. His rage built, a fascinating thing to watch, as his big body fairly trembled with the undeniable emotion.

"Is that so? You really think there's nothing worse than you killing her? Let me show you, Quinn. Watch this, and know this is happening because of your foolishness." Baras gestured angrily towards someone away from the holoterminal, barked some summons that Quinn didn’t understand. Not until he saw the slim figure of a dark-haired slave girl, just a girl. No one, really.

But she was human, small and so blessedly young – and Quinn watched them. He saw Baras reach out to compel her, to hold her down and in place. Long enough for several men to kick and hurt her, to rip at her and brutalize her as she lay there crying, crying for them to let her go. “Look what you made me do, Quinn! This is all your fault, that you let this happen to this poor child!” Quinn felt bile rise up in his throat as he watched.

He dropped his head, agonized. All he could hear was Lusiel's voice, the memory of her choked, imploring voice, as water rained down all around them in that long ago refresher stall. " _Quinn, swear. Swear to me you'll never let them hold me like that. Swear to me you'll stop them from holding me so that I can't move or fight them. Quinn … it_ frightens _me._ " Kneeling there now, with blood smeared across his face, Quinn gasped a hard, choked breath. He'd promised her!

"Ah. I see she did tell you, after all. I'm so glad we understand each other, Quinn." Baras' voice was ruthlessly cruel, brutal. "Because if you don't give her the quick, easy death I know you're capable of providing – well, then this is what will happen to her! You think it any kinder, to leave her to this fate rather than give her the peace and security of a simple death? Do you really think so? You’re wrong! She might last for _years_!"

"She can defeat you."

"You know – _know_ – there's no way she'll ever defeat me, Quinn!” Quinn’s head was lowered down, his mind swirling with pained worries. He didn’t see Baras’ hand clenched in a fist over the terminal, the cruel twist of the Force used on him. “You know me, Quinn! You know what I can do, you’ve seen it! How many years did we work together? There is no other way." Quinn's mind shuttered, every door in his head slammed shut except around that one single, blazing certainty. Just an absolute dogged belief that Baras was right, correct, and Quinn whispered agonized, “There’s no other way.”

Quinn felt his head begin to ache, shook himself. He felt fresh blood sliding from his broken nose. Why was his head hurting so bad, when it was his nose that was broken?

"I'm so glad we're working together again, captain." Baras was pleased once more. He watched as Draahg returned to the lounge and move towards Quinn. "Ah, Lord Draahg. I hope you've managed to subdue the entire crew. They live, correct? Good. Here's what you're going to do, now."


	85. Burn Lord Draahg, Burn

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is exactly how my in-game confrontation happened.

Pierce accompanied her to meet General Greist. He told her he once knew the man, fought for him. Pierce actually lauded the man, which was purely unusual. Pierce tended more to outright sneering and mocking those officers he followed. But he called Greist stubborn and determined, a tough officer, and his tone was heavy with admiration when he did.

So Lusiel took him with her to meet the man. Maybe, only maybe Pierce’s presence would help to convince Greist to do as he was directed, to act and move his battalion to Corellia. Better that, than be forced to kill the general. Lusiel hated to kill useful military leaders, especially when the war demanded they keep and maintain their very best.

Lusiel eyed Pierce as they walked through the doors into Armeggedon Batallion's headquarters, gauging him through the Force as they moved. No, she thought. Pierce was unlikely to object if she had to kill Greist. He was too focused determinedly on supporting Lusiel, rather. Not blind loyalty, but a simple and deep-seated appreciation, that his own interests were intrinsically bound to her own. If Lusiel failed, it would color everything he did after this, Pierce thought. Lusiel was satisfied she held another soldier’s will to her own.

Like the soldiers on Korriban, the steady disappointment that throbbed in their tone when she would tell them their fellows had fallen. Whatever recompense she offered, whether it was a bit of tech, a prize of some sort, or just the understanding their mission was finally finished successfully – she could always tell it wasn't enough and hated it. She mourned with them! While her fellow acolytes mocked her ready support of the soldiers, Lusiel just continued fighting for them. And it always paid off, winning their support through such simple regards. It was the soldiers who signaled her of impending threats, who showed up conveniently just before some fool acolyte tried striking at her – she won many times, only because of the soldiers.

She appreciated them. Maybe it was a byproduct of her earliest years waiting in front of a door for a soldier to return home and fight for her. But it never mattered why -- their loyalty was her reward.

Still. Greist started badly, and Pierce shifted restlessly next to her when the general opened with Baras’ name tossed in her face. He barked at her, "My orders come from Darth Baras himself. On who's authority are you operating?" Lusiel almost told him how lucky he was she wanted to keep him.

She decided to warn Greist, rather, "Don’t you dare use Baras to try coercing _me_ , general. By the time I’m through with him, Baras will be barely remembered. Except to judge whoever followed after him like dogs panting for his favors most accordingly."

Pierce interjected, “Mind you, general. People who don’t listen to my lord here end up pretty damn dead.”

Griest narrowed his eyes at Pierce, smoothing his fingers against his dark, bearded chin thoughtfully, "Pierce. You served with me at the Cleansing of Nopsin. Also remember promoting Phenter here instead of you."

Pierce nodded. "Made the right decision. Not for me to ride your coattails. Only looking to give you some friendly advice, here."

Greist became angry, "But you’ll ride this one’s tails? I don't respond well to threats, Pierce. You’re well aware of that." But Lusiel stepped close enough she was able to shake her fist up into the man’s startled face.

“This isn’t a threat. Threats are for easy men, simple men who can’t think, who don’t think. Men who are only ever things who jump and bark when they’re told. They’re useless in the end.” Lusiel snarled at him, "No, I _promise_ you. I’ll kill you, general. And then down the chain of command until I find someone in Armeggedon Batallion who _does as I say_!"

Greist looked at the Sith with wide eyes. He was frozen for several long moments. He glanced at Pierce, saw the man’s stony expression. Then he looked back at her, with her big brown eyes glaring black at him and her pale, beautiful features. She was so damned tiny, he thought. But there was fucking _fire_ in her!

She blazing well meant it, he thought. He could see that she would do precisely as she said. Not that he imagined it would take her very long to find someone who'd go along with her intentions, either. Hells, right next to him, Phenter would eagerly jump to do whatever the hell the Sith ordered.

No, his battalion would be going to Corellia, Greist figured. The only uncertainty right now was who'd be leading it there. And Greist seriously didn't want to lose his command, let alone his life. Not for the sorry opportunity to hunt Wampas and Tauntauns on Hoth, at least.

"Captain …" Greist sighed, gesturing towards his young subordinate. Phenter stood to attention, ready. "Ready the men. We're moving out for Corellia." The young soldier saluted him sharply, obviously pleased. And why not? Phenter had argued for days their presence on Hoth was useless, that they needed to be fighting on Corellia, rather. But Greist wasn't so cheerful. It was just as likely he'd lose his head once Baras learned they'd left Hoth.

He eyed Lusiel with a baleful gaze. "Are you happy now, Sith?"

She was unconcerned. She shrugged slowly, "Stop whining. It’s unbecoming of a general in this Empire, and I won’t tolerate it."

* * *

"My lord, there's no response from the captain.  It's not like him, not to bark at me whenever he gets a chance." Pierce was shaking his commlink, glaring at it as if the equipment itself had failed him somehow and needed to be punished. Lusiel almost grinned, except her senses were pricking at her. She gathered herself and focused, reaching out to see what might be so wrong.

And she found only blankness. She couldn't sense anything there, nothing of her space, her things on board her ship. Her people – nothing of Vette or Jaesa, not even Broonmark. Her husband … nothing. It was as if a wall impeded her from seeing anything she valued most. And walls were put up by enemies.

Lusiel felt herself settle into comfortable, simmering and consuming rage. She allowed it to grow, fanned it. She was threatened, her people were at risk. Her family, her marriage – her own Quinn. They depended on her! The rage built. She would not fail.

"He has my people, lieutenant," She spoke firmly, certainly.

Pierce looked at her, just stared. He thought he had never seen anything more gods-awful frightening in his life, than the look in her eyes right then. It was like a damned black hole, her gaze, and _he_ wanted to hide from her. But Pierce only pulled on his black helmet, its red markings glaring of his service to her, to _his_ Sith lord. He palmed his rifle, leaning down to check it for necessary charges.

Then he turned his head sideways, swore to her, "Then bring it on. We'll fucking kill them. My lord."

* * *

"Are you kidding me? Only one of them? This is hardly fair, my lord," Pierce grunted as he peered down towards the end of the docking bay to regard the figure, there. The bastard monster looming over the unconscious forms of her own people. Lusiel felt another rip of raging anger in her belly as she looked down at them.

Lusiel waved towards Pierce, "He's Sith. Do not underestimate Lord Draahg, lieutenant."

Draahg raised himself up from where he was leaning down over Broonmark, straightening to his full, impressive height as Lusiel stepped into the long, narrow bay. He smiled when he saw her, "I _knew_ you were strong. But gods! You’ve surprised me, Lord Lusiel! I mean … look at you! There’s not even a scar to mar such an exceptional, gods-damned perfect face – every one of your curves still so sweet, all your delicious parts intact. For someone I blew up personally, you’re looking remarkably well!"

Draahg looked down at her people again, as they lay there so stilly. The bay itself was burning, the crackling flames sounding loud in the background. Lusiel could see the ship's airlock broken and torn, obvious lightsaber burns marking its surface. "Your slaves put up such a fierce fight. What do you even feed the Talz? He almost tore my arm off," Draahg chuckled. He held the limb out for her to inspect, the bruised, clawed marks along his forearm obvious enough.

Lusiel glanced, saw Broonmark lying in a bloody heap. Quinn lay just beyond him, as if Broonmark had fought at the last just to keep Quinn from being harmed. Her husband's face was turned away from her, though. Probably a good thing, she thought. Had she seen any sign of injury done him, she wasn't certain she could have restrained herself from flying into the worst, most uncontrollable rage. And she needed to be focused, centered, now.

They lived, she knew. She could feel the life force of every one of her people, although each was battered and beaten. She understood their skill and tenacity, as well. That Draahg had managed to fell them indicated he was far stronger than she supposed when retrieving him from Vengean's chambers.

Of course he hid that strength from her during the adventure. Damn Draahg! As much a lying worm as Baras himself. She was so going to enjoy killing him, only hoped she'd manage to hurt him first. Draahg swung himself sideways, away from the crumpled forms of her husband and their followers. Lusiel followed him with her own darkening gaze, her hand clutching the handle of her lightsaber tight, tight. So tight in control.

"Darth Baras is the true Voice of the Emperor, you know. Soon he'll claim his rightful title." Draahg asserted. Lusiel snorted at him, then.

"Really, Draahg. Here I was, just thinking how impressively strong you are. And you go and admit you're a fool who believes what lies that maggot spymaster feeds to you. How droll." Lusiel rolled her eyes, "I have been tasked by the Emperor's Hand. If Baras was the true Voice, he would have their support. Except he doesn't. Why do you think that is?"

"Lies will not save you, friend."

"Oh, but I don't need saving, Draahg. And I am _not_ your friend."

She lashed out at Draahg with a Force push that sent him flying back and away from her people, listened to him thud with a loud bang against the ship's shattered airlock. She was leaping even as he hit the side of the Wing, activing her lightsaber in mid-jump. She sensed Pierce moving quickly to pull the crew off to the side and away from the fight.

Draahg met her with an angry shout, the blazing red of his lightsaber screaming against her own. He pushed her back, leaving her to hit the metal grating of the bay's floor, expelling a loud oof as she landed on her back. She managed to roll out of the way of Draahg's boots as he jumped after her, yelling, "You're dead!"

Lusiel leaped to her feet, her lightsaber coming up and whipping out against Draahg once again. "You thought so before, too. It will be fun proving how wrong you are this time around, too." She sent her saber winging out, striking Draahg against the side, before yanking it back to her once more. He shouted, beating at her with his lightsaber, its song brash and aggressive as it met her own blade over and over again.

Then Lusiel hit back, flaying against Draahg, her lightsaber a blur of punishing strikes as she steadily moved him back and forth across the bay. Pierce's rifle spit blaster bolts towards the Sith Lord suddenly, brilliantly blazing, but Draahg easily deflected every one of them. He finally compelled the Force to hold Pierce up in a vicious choke. Then Lusiel slashed towards his exposed belly, her lightsaber flashing hard against Draahg's armor and successfully forcing him into dropping Pierce to defend himself.

Draahg laughed, "Such a woman! You can’t handle seeing them hurt. But you just can’t kill me, you little fool! Believe me!"

Lusiel raised her lightsaber threateningly. "Of course. You're as immortal as the Emperor, surely. I'm absolutely terrified. Can't you tell?"

"Sarcasm suits you. You should see the way your sneer pulls at your lips, in fact. Perhaps you’d share that smile with me later, and in private.” Draahg waved his lightsaber back and forth, gently, “It doesn't change the fact you can't kill me. I've been gutted, bled dry, jettisoned into space. It only made me stronger, every time. You're doomed."

"That only means I can gain added satisfaction from your lingering pain, Draahg."

"Hurt me then! I welcome it!" Draahg turned suddenly, rushing towards Pierce who only raised his rifle against the Sith’s bullish charge.

Lusiel pushed Draahg again, listened to his frustrated yell as he went flying down the long length of the bay's floor. She ran towards him, her lightsaber already swinging as she yelled forcefully towards him.

She watched the impact of her shout, saw Draahg actually flinch back from her. But then he whipped out at her with his saber, the blunt music of his blade crashing against her armored breast. She grunted and stumbled back, then swung against him with her left fist and struck Draahg hardagainst the side of his head. Lusiel heard the crunch of his jaw, heard him grunt. Draahg leaned over and spit a number of bloody teeth from his mouth, before he looked at her furiously.

"Your persistence is glorious, Lusiel. But I'm losing patience with you."

"Well, then. I suppose my patience is superior, as well. Because you've bored me from the start."

Draahg roared his outrage as he jumped at her. Pierce's blaster bolt flew at him, though, zinging off the edge of his right leg and Draahg stumbled, hard at the very last moment. Draahg stopped, whipping out with his lightsaber at the soldier, so unexpectedly. Pierce tried moving out from its arching path, but the very tail-end of the strike caught him just along the barest edge of his shoulder. Pierce spun in place and fell down onto a single, thick knee. He looked over at Draahg when the Sith yelled triumphantly and came at him for one last killing blow.

Except Lusiel was suddenly standing there in front of him. Her lightsaber was held up and gleaming, even as Draahg attacked. The two Sith danced together, their lightsabers crooning deadly melodies, the lashing motions smooth and hard as they moved across the narrow space. Draahg was bigger, his size looming over Lusiel's smaller frame, and he tried using it to his advantage, pressing at Lusiel with what he assumed was greater strength. But Lusiel relied, rather, on her speed, agilely twisting around Draahg's attacks to assail him from the side and back. Bleeding slash marks began appearing all over Draahg's form, even as he grew more and more angry.

"You must be the luckiest being in the galaxy!" Draahg yelled.

Lusiel only smiled back at him, crooking a finger at him in wicked invitation. He roared, rushing at her like a rampaging Nerf, his face red with enraged fury. Lusiel jumped straight up, sailing over his head in a smooth gliding motion, watching as he ran by underneath her. She landed easily on her small feet, spun around to face Draahg, who looked over at her from where he stood against the railing. Lusiel raised her hand at him, pushing at him with the Force just one more time. Pierce blinked, watching as Draahg stumbled backwards and over the rail straight down headfirst into one of the blazing fires he had made there.

Pierce trotted over to the railing, stood there watching the Sith Lord burning down below. Lusiel panted, wiped at her face where sweat had gathered. She moved to stand next to Pierce, looking down at Draahg. Draahg writhed in the midst of the flames, screaming wildly against the pain.

Pierce grunted. "He'll burn to a crisp down there. I could shoot him and put him out of his misery. My lord?" He raised his rifle, sighted at the burning figure below. Lusiel glanced over at Quinn, saw the blood smearing the entire lower half of his face, the bruises that marked him everywhere she could see. She looked back at Draahg, cocked her head to listen to his screams, breathed in the scent of his burning flesh.

"Shut up, Pierce. I'm enjoying this."


	86. Calculations and Simulations and Promises

Quinn bent over the console, checking his figures once again. The simulations still showed significant problems, and he wouldn't tolerate continuing failure. After endless hours, he continued plugging and re-plugging his data into the computer, only to see the simulation fail once again.

He huffed a frustrated sigh, rubbed the back of his head wearily. He felt another headache pounding against his skull again. He should venture to the medical bay and run some tests to determine what was wrong. Perhaps the beating Lord Draahg had inflicted caused some damage he missed in his determination to repair the battered frames of the other crew members. It wouldn't be the first time he'd put the needs of a subordinate before his own. A good leader always ensured those who followed him were in good shape, even before serving his own needs.

But first. Perhaps if he changed the level of potency during the last quarter of the engagement, the simulation would be affected correctly. He ran several different numbers through careful calculations. Only to receive similarly flawed results. Damn it, he cursed. He _couldn't_ fail her.

"It's late, Quinn. What could possibly have you still in here, working?"

He spun around, startled. It was a testament to his growing frustration he hadn't even heard her approach, in fact. Lusiel was standing framed in the doorway to the bridge, the light from the hallway behind her illuminating the outline of her body. She was only wearing a thin robe, in fact. Probably something she had to go searching for, because she usually slept nude, he knew. Quinn eyed her heatedly, as the curved edges of her figure were brightened by the backdrop of the light until she nearly glowed.

Lusiel smiled at him. "You're obviously not interested in working anymore. So why are you still in here?"

He frowned, newly frustrated that he couldn't explain it to her. He hated this. He felt a renewed throbbing at the back of his head. "It's nothing, my lord. Merely running some calculations on our new security measures. I refuse to allow any further incursions onto the ship."

Lusiel stepped forward, allowing the door to close behind her. He heard the click of the latch. She was shaking her head, coming over to stand next to the galaxy map. He shut down the console in front of him so smoothly she never noticed. She watched the stars sliding by outside the viewport for several moments.

"For a moment, seeing you lying there …" Lusiel sighed.

"Don't, Lusiel." She spun around, prepared to argue with him. But he came to his feet, angrily, his hands clenched into fists. "No! Stop it! You know as well as I do that we must be prepared for such a possibility. You can not allow yourself to be compromised! Not for me, especially. I refuse it!" Quinn spun around, standing with his back to her, staring at the back wall of the bridge with unseeing eyes. He breathed roughly, then sighed tiredly. He reached back to rub at base of his skull again.

"Quinn, what's wrong? Tell me." Her voice was low, confused.

He clenched his eyes closed, trying to calm himself. Failing. She could feel his distress, his determination to do … something. Why wouldn't he just tell her, she thought. Lusiel closed her own eyes, concentrating.

She had worked with Quinn for the past two days at upgrading the ship's security protocols, gone through numerous diagnostics. The actual feeds from inside the ship during Draahg's attack had been ruined, the systems mangled when the Sith had cut through the side of the ship to get past the airlock and then banged around tossing crew members into walls. So she didn't know what had happened. Whatever it was, it left Quinn feeling he'd failed dreadfully.

He actually said so in the medical bay, even before the blood was fully cleaned off his face. He stood straight in the middle of the bay as he declared, “I am responsible, my lord. For every bruise and shattered bone, every torn rivet. All of it.” He ignored her snort of disagreement, just launched himself into ceaseless efforts at improving the ship’s security. He didn’t even sleep!

Now he muttered to her, "I can't. This is my failure." Quinn stood so still his voice at first startled her.

"Malavai ...?" But then he spun around, grabbing her upper arms. He shook her, staring into her eyes adamantly, "Let it go, Lusiel. I'll deal with it."

She responded as any other Sith would. She became angry. She shrugged off his hands, slapping them away. And she never dropped her eyes from his, "You overstep yourself. No one, not even you – you do _not_ deny me control."

Quinn's eyes flared, turned blue-black in the face of her upset. He slid his gaze down, taking in her chest, watched it swell in her agitation. Her nipples puckered, beading the front of her robe. The outer curves of her breasts were highlighted by the glow of the galaxy map behind her, turning them into shining globes of enticement. "Lusiel," he panted.

She watched him, felt herself dampen and tighten in growing arousal. "That's not fair," she whispered. "I was trying to be mad at you."

He grunted, "Don't." He reached up and pushed the edges of her robe off of her shoulders, watched it fall down along her arms to pool in a puddle at her feet. "Don't be mad at me, I can't stand it." He reached out to pluck at one of her nipples, watched her twitch in response. He raised his eyes to hers, lost himself in their dark depths.

He felt … better, then. She gave him _peace_. He felt it slide into him, felt the pain in his head taper off and disappear. He belonged to her, every bit of him did. So he'd show her that. Right now.

He palmed her breasts as he stepped closer. But she stopped him, making a mewling sound as she yanked and pulled at his uniform jacket. He reached down to help, kicking off his boots and tearing at his clothes until he was as naked as she was. Then he stepped close, reaching out to wrap her into his arms, rubbed his chest on her so that her breasts rolled against him. She moaned, holding the back of his head as she licked along the shell of his ear.

Quinn dropped his hands, clasping her rear to keep her pressed against him even as he urged her legs apart with one of his knees so that he could reach her sex with his fingers. He circled her clit softly, exulting in her voice against his ear as she pulled the lobe there into her mouth and started suckling gently. He panted as he ran his fingers lower to find her passage, touched the opening before penetrating it. His thumb continued fiddling with her clit even as he proceeded to run his fingers in and out of her in a steady rhythmic motion.

Lusiel keened, arching against him, spreading her legs to meet his thrusting fingers. But he didn't let her move too far, just crooned to her as she twisted against him. "Yes, Lusiel. That's it. Just like that. Give it to me, now." She came in a shattering burst of sensation, lowering her head against his shoulder to bite him there, just to keep from screaming out loud enough to wake the entire crew. He gasped at the pleasurable pain of her bite, felt her sucking at his flesh in the spot and hoped it would bruise. He never stopped rubbing softly at the vee of her thighs, rasped, "Yes. Gods, yes."

Then he picked her up under the back of her thighs, moving to settle her back against the nearby wall. "Legs … wrap your legs around me, Lusiel." He directed her, grunted as he felt her raise her feet and place them against the backs of his thighs. He leaned his head forward, tongued the side of her neck. He began licking and nibbling the skin there. He canted his hips until he could feel himself poised properly at her entrance and he groaned, felt her tighten just as he pressed himself forward.

He lowered her weight, let her slide down onto him. He felt himself deeper inside of her than he'd ever been before. She raised her head, let it fall back against the wall. He heard her whisper his name, heard her say, "Malavai." Her hands clutched at him, her fingers running through the hair at his nape.

He began rocking his hips, pushing himself back and forth inside her. He held her, moved her on him. She was so tight, so wet. He felt the drag and pull of her inner muscles on his erection, heard the sound of slaps her thighs made against his groin as he continued thrusting wildly into her. She was gasping, twitching. Their bodies became damp, slid against each other. He watched enthralled as her breasts bounced in front of him, glistening with sweat and glowing in the light from the map.

He clutched at the cheeks of her backside, digging his fingers in so hard he was sure he'd leave bruises on her pale skin. But she only moaned, heatedly crying aloud as a second orgasm tore through her. He felt it, felt the warm, wet muscles clasp him, tighten and squeeze around him. The sensation was so intense that Quinn came in a violent rush, thrusting once, then twice, even as he poured himself into her. He leaned against her, breathing roughly and luxuriating in the feel of her hands running up and down his back.

"Malavai. Love you, Malavai." Quinn heard her as she whispered against his throat. He squeezed his eyes shut. I promise you, he thought. I promise I won't let him do that to you. Not ever.


	87. Whuddle the Hutt

Lusiel emerged from the spaceport into the dry, aching heat of Mos Illa with a shudder. She glanced at the Twi'lek next to her, shaking her head, "You're lucky, Vette, that I like you. Really like you. Because I really hate this planet."

Vette laughed. "Only like? Ah, my lord. You're breaking my heart. I thought you _loved_ me!" She laughed even harder when Lusiel scowled at her. "Careful, my lord. Your dark expression is scaring the locals."

Lusiel muttered as she watched some of the farmers and thugs loitering near the spaceport take off running after they observed her temperamental grimace, "At least I'm clearing the area of potential criminal behavior."

"Oh, yes, of course, my lord. You’re a regular servant of the people," Vette nodded, dramatically solemn. She giggled again, however. And ducked Lusiel’s narrow-eyed gaze, changing the subject smoothly, "Let me verify the address where Tivva asked to us to meet her. I can't believe I'm going to see mother again! I'm so excited!"

Lusiel smiled slightly as they maneuvered through the crowded marketplace outside the spaceport, bypassing the vendors’ stalls. Most of the people scrambled out of their way as they moved along, trying to avoid the attention of the Sith warrior. The patience she offered her tiny blue slave was a bit befuddling to those watching, though. The costly leathers Vette was wearing, dyed red and black to match the robes worn by her master -- those demonstrated a worth applied to the slave that was noted by everyone who watched them pass. So that the commentary following the Sith and her twi’lek property were in general agreement before very long.

Bother that particular pair, they all whispered, and you'd end up with a lightsaber across your ass.

"There it is, my lord! There's Tivva!" Vette waved towards her sister as they approached the doorway leading up towards what amounted to a brief hovel where Tivva was standing woodenly. Lusiel eyed the older twi'lek, easily noting the tension lining her form long before Vette realized her sister was even unhappy. The waves of distress coming from the blue-skinned woman were intense enough that Lusiel tried catching Vette with a small hand, warningly.

But Vette was already bouncing forward, calling to Tivva excitedly. So Vette actually reached her with a bounding smile, and Tivva burst into tears. Vette stopped suddenly, stunned, "What is it, Tivva? What's wrong?" Vette's lekku shook roughly as she trembled there. Lusiel grimaced, as she shot a dark look towards the open door just behind the Twi'leks. The smell of death coming from the place was a bitterly sour thing.

Tivva cried, "We were only two days too late. It's not fair! Two lousy days!"

"Too late?" Vette looked towards the door, trembling harder. "Ah no. Please, Tivva. No."

Lusiel placed a hand on Vette's shoulder, "I'm so sorry, Vette."

Vette squared her shoulders, nodding. She stepped towards the door along with Tivva, both the women ducking through the opening into the cool interior. Lusiel followed, although she stopped just inside the entrance. She only watched as the two women stepped up to the table where an older twi'lek woman was laid out in repose. An old man stood nearby, his pale red skin chapped from countless days working under the dry burn of Tatooine’s two suns. He slowly told Tivva and Vette how their mother died, and Lusiel listened.

"Slaves, was all either one of us was. We worked hard for Whuddle the Hutt here in Mos Illa Hard work, he makes us all carry heavy thing. Unless you’re young, beautiful. But your mother wasn’t, she was old. When I tried helping her, Whuddle’s men just whipped me.”

Tivva glared down at her mother’s corpse, angry, "It's not right. I’m tired of things that aren’t _right_."

"Vette. How is your mother being cared for?" Lusiel pondered. As the old man explained he could only afford to bury Vette's mother behind his shop, with mere stones to keep wild animals from gnawing on the corpse, Vette began to cry. Lusiel frowned at him.

"No, we have credits enough for a proper ceremony.” Tivva pulled a credit chip from her pocket, handing it to the old man. “Make the arrangements. We have to celebrate our mother's life." She glared towards the empty doorway as he left, then turned around to glare down at Vette’s bent head, “Stop crying. We have to get that bastard Hutt."

"Tivva … please. I'm just so sad. I don't want to think about something like revenge right now."

"Come on, Vette! How can you think to stand at mother's funeral knowing the Hutt who killed her is still living? I can't. I won't! Are you going to help me, or not?" Tivva was almost stomping her foot.

But Vette was still doubtful, "What do you think, my lord?"

Lusiel shook her head. "Vette, I'm Sith. I'm determined to destroy my old master, because he betrayed me and nearly killed my husband and crew. What do you believe _I'm_ thinking?" Vette nodded, her tearful gaze still glued to her dead mother's face. Then she turned and followed her sister.

* * *

Vette waved at the cantina vendor, silently asking for a refill. He frowned as he poured some more green liquid into her cup, watched as she tossed it quickly into her throat. She twisted her lips against the bitter taste.

Mostly he was eyeing the men who came closer and closer to the twi'lek standing alone against the bar. He wasn't stupid. He saw the girl following along with a Sith Lord earlier in the day. Hell, the markings on her leathers clearly identified where her loyalties belonged. And one didn't mess with the property of Sith Lords. Not and lived long to tell of it. A Sith rampaging through his cantina to reassert her claim to a slave, though – well, that _wasn't_ something he wanted to see.

Vette seemed oblivious to all of it, though. She was purely intent on drinking herself into incoherency, in fact. Or at least enough that she could stop seeing her mother's body burning in the waning light of the Tatooine sunset. She jumped when someone finally purred right alongside her ear, from just behind her.

"Hello, you pretty little thing."

Vette glared at the man who leaned against the bar next to her but he only laughed so softly. He was a handsome bit of male human, she thought. His hair was black, just a bit long in the back, hanging in shaggy tendrils against his nape. His jaw was angular and strong, shaded with the barest hint of stubble. His full lips were curled in what she took to be a habitual grin, as well. And his eyes … his eyes seemed strangely familiar. Dark pools of rich brown. Like warm chocolate.

Vette shrugged, "I'm not in the mood. I was at a funeral earlier."

"Really? Sorry to hear it. Someone close to you?"

"My mother, actually."

He murmured at her, a small soothing sound. She tossed back another large sip of alcohol, wondering idly what sort of liquor she was drinking. She stopped paying attention to what it was hours earlier, actually.

She didn't even notice her new companion shooting dark looks towards the goons meandering closer to where she was slumped. They blanched, raising their hands in surrender as they backed towards the door, rather. They all knew him, enough to know his rifle spit unerringly when he loosed bolts during particularly heated confrontations. He returned his attention to the twi’lek when she went back to whining down into her drink.

"If we'd only come just a few days earlier, we might have saved her. It's just so unfair," Vette was saying.

"We? You have friends nearby? Someone to keep an eye on you? It's not exactly the safest place, Mos Illa." He smiled at her, his grin becoming infectious. She found herself smiling back, in fact. Who would ever believe she'd be in the mood to smile so soon after finding her mother had died? He really was adorable, though.

"I serve my lord, actually. No one messes with her. She's … hic … Sith." Vette nodded, as emphatically as her increasing drunkenness allowed.

"A Sith? A real one? Wow. What's she doing here on Tatooine?"

Vette glared at him again, "My mother, I said. We thought she was alive, though. Came here and found she'd died. It was a real bummer. Don't worry, though. The friggin' Hutt who worked her to death is as dead as she is, now. Bastard worm!"

"Oh. She killed the Hutt?"

"No. It was family business. Me and my sister killed Whuddle."

"Whuddle?"

"The Hutt!"

He shook his head, chuckling over at her. He stood straighter, held out his hand towards her, "You're very drunk. Would you like me to escort you back to your Sith's ship?"

She looked at him, ran her eyes down his frame, took in the way his leather armor stretched across his shoulders. "I'm tired, actually. You have a room?"

"Of course," he drawled, his dark eyes smoldering back at her. He waved towards the bartender, handed him a chip with several credits on it. Vette frowned through her wavering vision, “I drank a lot. It’s expensive.”

He smiled soothingly at her, “I know what it’s like to lose a parent, Vette. I imagine my father left me quite better off, than your poor mother managed. Please don’t worry.” Vette teared up slightly, leaned her head down on his shoulder as they walked – well, she stumbled honestly – towards the nearby stairs.

She didn’t stop to wonder how he knew her name. And she never saw him lift his chin towards the beautiful Rattataki woman occupying a table just across from the bar.

* * *

Vette came awake when she heard the chirping of a commlink, followed by a brief conversation between a man in the room with her and some female at the other end of the link. She lay there listening for several moments. Apparently, the woman was concerned for the man's safety. "Didn't Kaliyo tell you? No, of course not." He sighed, then. "Don’t worry. I'll be on my way soon enough. I’m very nearly finished here."

Vette rolled over as the conversation ended. She pulled the sheets on the bed up to cover her naked torso, looking up at the ceiling. She felt the bed dip as the man edged forward, crawling along her length until he was finally leaning over her, smiling. He pulled back the sheet to expose her again. She admired the brush of dark hair across his temple.

"Do you ever stop smiling?" She asked, her head canted thoughtfully as she regarded him.

He laughed, "Do you know how many people have asked me that?" He leaned down to kiss her, running his tongue into her mouth with a smooth and experienced motion. She tangled her tongue against his, warbling happily into his mouth.

"Who was that?" She asked him after he finally leaned back again, dropping his gaze to take in her naked breasts with heated eyes. He hummed approvingly as he watched her breasts rise and fall as she stretched.

"Huh? Oh. My wife."

Vette was startled. Her fingers flew to cover her breasts, causing him to cluck his tongue in upset. "Your wife? I didn't know you were married."

"Stop covering those. I like them."

"But you're married!"

"Yes. Now show me. Move your hands, come on."

Vette pursed her lips, scowling at him, "No. Stop it. I don’t poach!"

He sighed, came up onto his knees as he straddled her there on the bed. "You're being silly, Vette."

"Silly?"

"Yes. My wife knows very well I am quite a good friend to any number of people, when needed. I always return to her." He shrugged, still eyeing her breasts. He tweaked her nipple as it peaked between two of her fingers. Vette frowned up at him.

"I've never heard of anything like that. Do you hate her that much?"

She saw his brow twist into a dark frown, his eyes narrow into almost slits in his handsome face. "No. I do not.” He shrugged, tried twisting his mouth into a new grin. But he was too adamant. And she managed to catch the hint of Imperial accent in his denial, too. “Family is very important to me, Vette. You should know that much, I guess.” He was suddenly very, very serious. She shivered, glanced over at his armor and weapon, how close they were to the bed. Never really out of reach.

She whimpered, “You’re dangerous.”

Then he did smile, “Not to you, and especially not right now.” He hummed again, running his fingers back and forth along hers, where she continued mashing her breasts.

She eyed him suspiciously, "You're an Imperial."

"I'm your friend, actually. Isn't having friends nice?"

"Depends on what those friends want from you, doesn't it?"

He threw his dark head back, laughing. "Ah, Vette. I do like you." Then he looked back down at her. "Honestly, right now I only want to see your beautiful titties again. Maybe touch them. Come now. You liked it last night when I used my mouth to suck them."

"And after? What then?"

He cocked his head, grinning at her. "Well. After -- we'll be friends. And I'll give you the means to contact me if you need to. Because friends help each other, right? If you ever needed help, like – oh, I don't know – like if some Sith wannabe lord forced his way onto your ship and beat you and your friends up, well, then you could let me know and I'd be able to come and help."

She gaped at him. "How did you …?" But she stopped when he shook his head at her. "Okay, then. But I won't spy on my lord. If you think that's what I'll ever do, you're a fool. I'd die before I betrayed her."

He chuckled, "Oh, you sweet thing. Vette, trust me. If I thought for a moment you'd betray her, we would _not_ be friends anymore."

She heard the threat throbbing through his grinning words. What amazed her, though, was that it didn't really frighten her. She was suddenly excited, rather. She felt her sex tighten into damp readiness for his touch. He smiled at her as her hands fell away from her breasts.


	88. Bargains and Agreements

Madaga-Ru could feel her coming, sensed her as she followed the proper path seeking him out. He concentrated on her, this off-worlder, this one who wasn't Voss but still used the same energies their mystics did. She was following the one who came before, the one who was Voss but housed something else, something dark and terrible.

He knew, because she was dark like that one was. Although … she was different, too. The other one was immense, far beyond her in age and power. Not that Madaga-Ru thought she wasn't powerful. No, she ached with it, was driven to attain it and hold it. Like the other. Unlike him, however, there were still people she clung to, cared for. Her feelings grounded her, as the other one was not and had not been for a long time.

He found her interesting, actually. He anticipated meeting her.

* * *

Fire leapt up, the signal burning brightly against the pale gold of the sky. Lusiel felt force energy surge along with it as she stepped back from the signal, dropping her fire starter back into her pouch. She frowned, felt the air itself become heavy with presence. She looked around, trying to find the being responsible for creating such power. She glanced to her side, saw that Quinn appeared just as confused as she felt.

"What do you sense, captain?" Lusiel asked.

"I've never felt anything like it, my lord. It must be powerful if even I can feel it, however," he pondered aloud.

Even as he spoke, Lusiel felt the figure materializing behind them, so that she spun to face him. It appeared to be a holo image, she thought. Although it gleamed golden in the waning light of the day, rather than the standard gray images she was so accustomed to seeing on Imperial holoterminals.

"Voss welcomes you, outsider. Why do you seek Madaga-Ru?" The image asked. Lusiel regarded the Voss thoughtfully. The Voss seemed to speak in stilted, almost artificial terms. She wasn’t entirely certain she liked it, if only because it was so hard to discern their emotions. It made her feel off-balance, this stilted tone the Voss used. Lusiel wondered how much true communication depended on such subtle nuances.

"He has knowledge I need," Lusiel replied. She felt a burst of satisfaction come from the figure, knew that she'd impressed the man.

"A worthy goal. Madaga-Ru will meet you."

Lusiel glared as the image disappeared, “Oh goody.”

* * *

Lusiel gazed around the dwelling, at the table and chairs, the bed. It didn't appear to be a defensible place, unless you counted the secrecy of its location. The house was set out in one of the most remote locations she could never have managed except by pointed direction. The Voss himself – Magadu-Ru, she assumed -- he was standing next to the bed, his feet on one of those colorful rugs she'd discovered were common on the planet.

The Voss people seemed to enjoy bright colors, so that their clothes as well as their homes typically displayed the most intense tints and dyes of mostly blue and greens, some yellows, too. It came, she thought, from the fact their own skin was likewise brightly hued. The overall effect tended to be somewhat jarring to the senses. Lusiel far preferred more muted tones like black and grey. The only bright color she enjoyed was red, making it one of her signature shades.

The Voss gestured at her, encouraging her to come closer. "I am Madaga-Ru. I appeared at the signal pyre. I appear here." He peered at her and she felt the wash of his senses, his curiosity over her, "I recognize you. Another came – of Voss but housing darkness, like you."

Lusiel smiled as she recognized the most brief hint of disgust in his tone. Although she wondered if she should be glad she'd dealt with the Voss enough to begin appreciating the true nuances of their language. Not that she was as disdainful of the Voss as Darth Serevin was. She imagined he'd gladly wipe the Voss off the world entirely if he thought he could get away with it. But their strength was too impressive.

Sad, perhaps, that Serevin's lame slinking around Voss strength would probably secure the Empire's place on the planet. Lusiel was too blunt and straightforward to really appreciate such skulking measures.

Apparently Madaga-Ru preferred honesty, as well. She considered him for several moments when he requested a secret from her. Some exchange for his knowledge of the path the Voice had taken on Voss. Lusiel wondered what he hoped to really gain from her, in having her describe one of her secrets. What sort of test was this? Because she didn't believe the motion was meaningless, not even to him.

She felt Quinn press close behind her, felt his need to comfort and soothe her. He understood what it was to a Sith, to give up a secret. Secrets exposed weaknesses, after all. Quinn would have far preferred Lusiel keep her secrets close and refuse the Voss such a boon. She had felt him increasingly disagreeing with many of her decisions in recent weeks … it was confusing her, actually.

Madaga-Ru, however, only kept his glittering orange eyes focused on her, and he waited patiently. It wasn't compulsion but custom. As he said, a give and a take, an exchange of information and insight. She only sensed there was a purposeful direction to the Voss' request, something he hoped to gain from it that she couldn't necessarily see right then.

She nodded at Madaga-Ru, "Very well, a secret then. During my training, I disobeyed my master and severed the hand of my overseer, rather than kill him. He serves me still." Behind her, Quinn frowned in consternation. Was he upset that she had disobeyed Baras so very soon, perhaps? Or was it, rather, that she spoke such a truth here?

But Madaga-Ru was satisfied. "An admission is made. The act is payment." The Voss turned away, and Lusiel sensed his pain of memory. And his relief, too. That she showed him there would be no force or compulsion to win the secrets of the Voss. Something the Voice had not respected, was Voss customs. Magada-Ru nodded, "Yes. I could not deny him. He went to the Dark Heart Chamber in the Nightmare Lands. You must follow him."

"What is the Dark Heart Chamber?"

"It is ancient, forbidden. The secrets of Voss are buried there. The denied truth. Your predecessor wrapped himself in the Blessing of Oneness – without it, an outsider can not even _see_ the gateway to the Dark Heart.” Magada-Ru sighed, “Vana-Xo can bestow the Blessing upon you, though. Once you complete the trials."

"But he is trapped."

"No. Not if you respect Voss Ways. If you do not, the Dark Heart will be denied."

"What does the Blessing of Oneness do?"

"Makes visible what is invisible. Vana-Xo is the only healer trained in it," Madaga-Ru pointed, his gaze hard suddenly. "Off. Get the Blessing at the Shrine of Healing. I will guide you when I can."

He watched as she turned to go. He closed his eyes, meditated briefly. She had to succeed. She was the only one who might defeat the Darkness, there, and remove the contagious presence that had become ensnared. Without her, the Voss might be tainted beyond repair.


	89. Don't Call Me That

"You're late, lieutenant." Captain Lorant glared at Pierce as he entered the room where the team was gathered. Pierce shot her a cool nod, though. Because he certainly wasn’t going to justify himself.

"Yea, well. My lord had some business elsewhere. We caught a ride on a transport with some soldiers from Armageddon Battalion, over from Hoth. Took us a bit longer to get here than I thought," Pierce grunted an explanation.

"Business elsewhere? I thought you said we'd have Sith support, Lieutenant Pierce." Lorant frowned, staring.

"Yea, and we do," Pierce shrugged, even as several whistles began sounding outside. Pierce rolled his eyes slightly, turning towards the door and glaring as Jaesa ambled through it. He watched her walk towards them, her hips rolling in that sensuous gait of hers, that he typically enjoyed. When they were in private. And naked. But he’d been stupid enough to insult one of her robes recently, laughed at how it bared her sweet little belly. Pierce wanted to kick himself as she finally reached his side, but he only muttered sourly under his breath, "So. You've proved your point, and thanks." Jaesa smiled back at him, enjoying the game.

"Captain,” Pierce announced. “This is the apprentice of Sith Lord Lusiel, Jaesa Willsaam. She'll be fighting at the front as we take the Bastion." Jaesa lifted her chin, stubborn and cool as the soldiers in the room studied her. Captain Lorant frowned, though.

"How many years has it been since you were on Korriban, my lord?” Lorant dropped her studied gaze down Jaesa’s length, examining the tops of her shoes peeking from under the edge of her red-trimmed robe. Jaesa shrugged nonchalantly, “I was never on Korriban, rather.”

The soldiers groaned in certain unison, and Lorant shot Pierce a hard glare. He chuckled over at her, “She managed some time on Tython, though. Likes being out from under Jedi directions. You guys want to play, or what?”

Jaesa smiled darkly, "Pierce doesn't like admitting the number of times I've beaten him. He carries the bruises for days. I think he even wore his breakfast once or twice." Pierce eyed her balefully, his lips pursed. But Jaesa only smirked even wider.

"This pretty little lady beat you, Pierce?" Sergeant Arlos laughed over at him from where he was standing across the table displaying maps of the target and surrounding area. He was holding a datapad, of course. The man never went far without a piece of tech in his hands.

Pierce glared at him. "Don't think to try her out, Arlos. She'd most likely kill your skinny ass."

Arlos smiled broadly, "Now that sounds interesting."

"Enough, all of you." Lorant stepped up to the display, gesturing. "General Rakton has given us leave to take the Bastion. Now, we've all been waiting ages for this, so we need to do it right! Lieutenant Tanido has successfully produced a supply of his upgraded rifles with grenade launcher attachments. Make sure the mods are good to go, Tanido! Any questions?"

Arlos raised his hand. "Yea. Can we watch Pierce get beaten by the tiny little girl he brought along to the pissing match, captain?"

The room erupted into a mixture of boos and laughter, as the soldiers belted out comments either supporting the notion or negating it. Captain Lorant frowned at Arlos, started to say something biting and pointed. But then they all watched Arlos rise up through the air, until he was launched across the room. He landed with a loud harrumph of sound near the far wall.

The room fell silent, as Arlos climbed unsteadily back to his feet. Everyone turned to look at Pierce and Jaesa. Pierce only shrugged, "What? Not like I didn't warn 'im. 'Sides … he's not even bruised. Lucky bastard. Last time she did that to me, I busted my nose and bled all over the damn ship. Had to get blasted Quinn to fix it."

He glared at Jaesa, who only patted him on his armored shoulder. Jaesa turned to the troops gathered silently now around the table. "Don’t call me a tiny little girl," she warned.

"No shit," murmured Torant.


	90. Always Another Way

The Voss healers adamantly rejected Quinn's offer of medical aid and treatment. He looked around at their injured and ill, many writhing in pain on various pallets strewn across the floor of the shrine. One man screamed out just then, his painful wheezing pitiful in the open space of the temple. "Are you certain? I may be able to do something to help."

"You are an outsider. You do not understand Voss. You can not help." The healer closest to him shook her head. He wasn't sure if she was being polite or abrupt. It was so hard to tell when it came to the Voss.

Quinn watched Lusiel, saw her speak to one of the healers. The Voss pointed towards the back of the room, where a number of the most seriously hurt were gathered around a Voss woman draped in healer's robes. Even from where they were standing, Quinn could see the unwell grimacing and twisting from the pain they were suffering. Lusiel waved at him, already moving towards the healer.

"Are you Vonna-Xo? I require the Blessing of Oneness." Lusiel said. The healer didn't respond, though. She gestured over one of the injured, rather, and Quinn watched as a bright light glimmered over the man for several moments. He continued crying painfully, however, even after the light had dissipated. The healer whimpered, her body bowing in apparent sympathy or distress of some sort.

Voss healing was utterly ineffective, Quinn decided. He made a brief mental note, that Lusiel would not be treated in any Voss clinics.

"I know what it is you're seeking, outsider. But you are not Voss. The Blessing bestows privileges. I hesitate – you cause my insides to scream." The healer frowned at Lusiel.

But Lusiel only grinned back at her. She joked, "Perhaps your last meal isn't agreeing with you."

"Humor. You laugh easily. It eases my suspicions. Apologies. The Voss are leery when it comes to strangers." Vonna-Xo smiled, her red skin with its blue swirling markings still glistening with sweat as she rose from where she knelt to recover from her healing motions. "But to be granted the Blessing a sacrifice must be made."

Lusiel considered her. She nodded, "For every thing gained a price must be paid."

"Yes. You begin to understand the Voss, I see." Vonna-Xo smiled again. "To heal, I siphon strength from the able. Will you submit your strength, that these may be healed?"

Lusiel looked around her at the writhing supplicants, listened to their pained whimpers and cries. She nodded. "Yes. I offer my strength willingly." Quinn hissed, alarmed. He stepped forward, prepared to disagree with Lusiel's intention. But she looked back at him, shaking her head. "It will be fine, Quinn. You'll see."

He subsided, his jaw clenched in distress. He looked around at the sick and ailing Voss, frowning. He watched the healer, Vonna-Xo step towards Lusiel, raising her red hands. She said, "Remain still…" Lusiel nodded, kneeling at the woman's feet. Quinn growled when he heard Lusiel gasp, saw her back arch as energy seemed to be sucked from her form. He leapt forward to catch her as she suddenly slumped back, unconscious.

Quinn cradled Lusiel against him as her head lolled back across his arm, listless. He barely noticed the Voss turning and expelling healing energy towards the ailing people on the ground around the shrine. A large number of the wounded began climbing back to their feet as the energy swept through the room. Even the most sick were renewed, their faces appearing peaceful as their pain finally diminished. But Quinn focused on his lord, his wife …he moved her hair back from her face. He breathed out in relief when he saw she was only resting, her form utterly depleted.

"She had tremendous strength." Quinn looked up at Vonna-Xo, then. He noticed several Voss approaching, as if to handle the Sith, touch her. But he pulled her closer, refusing any of them near her. Vonna-Xo smiled at him, "The Blessing is granted. Your love of her is obvious. It speaks well of my choice."

"She would probably thank you," Quinn shook his head.

Vonna-Xo shrugged. "Thanks are not necessary. She sacrificed so that others might be bettered. It was a good bargain." Quinn turned to leave, holding Lusiel to him.

"You will regret it, when you act against her. The pain of it will ravage you for many years," Vonna-Xo warned him.

He stiffened, his shoulders going tense and hard. He looked down into Lusiel's face, smoothing his gaze across the curves of her jaw and eyes. He looked back at the Voss, breathed, "There's no other way."

Vonna-Xo shook her head. "There is always another way, outsider. It is not for you to see, however. You are lost. She must find you before it's too late. When she does, you will be safe again."

Quinn shook his head at her, confused, "You're not making any sense."

"I know. It is because I am not an interpreter. Go. Care for her."

He sighed as he turned once again to leave. He really did not like anything of Voss.


	91. Dreams of Legacy

Lusiel knelt down amidst the darkness, felt it pulsing and swirling around her. She felt her knees pressing into the soft ground, looked down and frowned at the appearance of the reddish grass. _Where am I_ , she wondered.

She froze as the sound of footfalls reached her. "Who's there?"

She rose to her feet, yanking at her lightsaber, firing it so that the red glare illuminated the immediate space around her. There was a responding chuckle from the darkness. "Oh, I think I can do you even better."

Lusiel watched as two lightsabers came to blazing life, their crimson glow revealing the figure of a human woman standing nearby. The woman swung her sabers in gentle arcing motions motion, humming lightly. She glanced at Lusiel, smiled. "Are we going to fight, then? Wouldn't be the first time."

"I don't know you," Lusiel replied, frowning.

"Really? Well that’s new. Even when you slept in that damned cage, we came here together. You taught me." The woman came closer, standing directly in front of Lusiel. She was young, perhaps twenty years of age. Lusiel took in her features, the high cheekbones and slanted eyes. Her hair was thick and black ebony. But her eyes were brilliant blue, all the more because of her dark hair framing her face in thick waves. She laughed at Lusiel's consternation. "You actually don't know me, do you? That's funny. Where are you then?"

Lusiel glanced around, regarded the inky darkness shrewdly, the red grass. "Is this Voss?"

"Oh, no, not here. This is _our_ place, actually. You, though. You're on Voss?"

Lusiel nodded in sudden understanding. "This is a dream."

"Duh. I'm disappointed it took you so long, actually." The woman tsked at her, shaking her dark head as if in gloomy sadness. But her blue eyes were twinkling.

Lusiel smiled. "Not surprising, I suppose. Voss mystics often have visions. The Force must be stronger, here, to encourage such things. But _they_ dream of the future." Lusiel frowned, leaning forward as she examined the other woman. "Who are you?"

The woman laughed. "What would be the fun of just answering your questions? Aren't you supposed to figure it out for yourself?"

Lusiel saw the girl-woman’s eyes glisten slowly with the purest sort of amusement, felt a sudden thrill move through her. She reached out to smooth her fingers along the woman's jaw, pushing her hair back over her ear, much as she did her husband's, "Oh, you look like him."

"He loves it when you say it, too."

"He would," Lusiel rolled her eyes.

The woman suddenly frowned. "If you’re on Voss, it’s nearly time. You’ll have to fight."

Lusiel nodded, "I'll destroy Baras."

The woman became frantic. "No, not that. You have to fight him first."

"Who?"

"He might kill you, you know. Because you won't want to hit back. Baras picked the perfect weapon."

"What are you talking about?"

"You already know what to do. You read the journals, the texts. Why haven't you already saved him?"

"I don't understand."

"You could lose."

"I won't."

"But you haven't done what needs doing. You're scared!"

"I fear nothing!"

"You're too late! Baras has already acted!"

"What do you mean?" Lusiel spun in place, watching as the Marauder stomped her foot and paced around her, continuing to rant at her.

She heard Quinn's voice, suddenly, his distress echoing through the dream space. "Lusiel! Wake up!"

Lusiel canted her head, watched the woman stop. She seemed to hang there, frozen in place as she listened. She turned to regard Lusiel with a serious expression. "You don't have much time left, mother."

* * *

Lusiel gasped back to awareness, staring up at the top of the shelter Quinn must have erected against the dark Voss night. She turned her head to regard her husband, as he sank back onto his heels next to her. He was obviously aching with relief. She smiled at him.

"You worried when I told you not to." She shook her head slightly.

Quinn shrugged. "I'm sorry. I don't actually trust Voss mystics. They speak in riddles. I wasn't certain their healings were much different."

"Riddled healings? I'll have to remember that one."

Quinn smiled. "I have food prepared. You should eat."

Lusiel nodded, rising to join him next to the heat source. Quinn handed her a piece of flat bread stuffed with green vegetables and strips of nerf beef. They settled down next to each other, eating quietly. She nudged him with her hip, chuckling when he nudged her back. He smiled as she giggled around her food.

"You were unconscious. It bothered me." Quinn frowned at her as he made the admission.

Lusiel settled herself, slowly closing her eyes as she contemplated, "I was dreaming. It was nice."

"What did you dream about?"

She nudged him again, laughing slightly when he shot her an irritated glance. "I was dreaming about your daughter, actually."

Quinn choked on the bite of sandwich he'd just started chewing, coughing vigorously. Lusiel chuckled softly, with a sultry edge as she playfully pounded his back with helpful fervor. He shrugged her off of him, though, looking over at her. "Daughter?" His blue eyes flared as he scanned down her frame, focused on her flat belly.

Lusiel placed her slender palm over the softest part of her stomach, just where her daughter would eventually grow. She smiled, "Well … not yet, at least. But it won’t be long now. I wouldn’t dream of her unless she was near enough."

He didn’t look away from her abdomen, stayed thoughtful. He breathed roughly, “I would give everything of myself for that to happen.” Quinn was ponderous, so serious it was nearly an aching, hard thing in his darkly blue eyes. Lusiel frowned at the fear that moved in him, that it would never happen. She whispered his name, reaching out to smooth her fingers along his jaw and watched him bend his head into her touch.

"Quinn. Your guidance will be a source of strength for our children."

He closed his eyes, "You make me stronger. I want your legacy to endure."

"My legacy is yours as well, Malavai." She watched him close his eyes again. He swallowed. Then he whispered to her, softly rasping.

"I will love you forever, Lusiel."


	92. These Monsters, These Sith

Madrik pushed his small, lean frame behind the crates that contained pieces of scavenged metal and resources that several patrols had gathered during forays closer to Voss-Ka, shooting a quick glance towards the center of the camp. The Warmaster was speaking there, to some of his greatest warriors. Madrik could hear the steady drone of his voice, even if he couldn't make out the words.

His friends had taunted him, said he wasn't brave enough to get close to the Warmaster and hear his words. Not after the monster had come through the camp earlier, they said. Several very powerful chieftans had been slain, their bodies torn to pieces. "The creature didn't have eyes! Just red flames that shot out and consumed them in agony," the boys had whispered to each other. The rumors were the monster would come back, that it was hunting their mightiest leaders at the behest of the scum Voss.

So they dared Madrik, to get close to the Warmaster in time to confront the monster face to face. Madrik was certain there was no monster great enough to destroy the Warmaster. So he easily accepted the dare and crept closer and closer to where the enormous Gormak gathered to argue with his captains over the course of battle. He edged around the corner of the crate, trying to hear what the Warmaster was saying. But even with his horned head as far close as he dared to move, he still couldn't discern the actual words.

He began angling towards the backwards end of the crate, moving to circle towards the next set of crates closer to the arguing warriors. But then he heard a screeching call, distress and fear echoing. The Warmaster looked up, barking an order to the Gormak gathered around him. Madrik looked over towards the resonating calls, saw an arcing ribbon of crimson, and gasped. The monster's eyes, he thought, horrified.

He ducked down behind the crate, fear gripping him so strongly the fringe along both sides of his head shook and trembled. He listened with terror in his veins as strong warriors screamed their way into death. He quivered, his small frame shaking so hard the crate next to him shifted.

Suddenly, Madrik heard the vibrant war cry of the Warmaster himself, a shout that invited confrontation. He yelled out, "Come to me, Sith! I will destroy you now!" Madrik shook his head, cringing his head around the crate to look towards the area he'd watched the warriors gathered. He wondered what a Sith was, what form the beast took. It had to be immense, titanic even. He imagined one of the giants from the old tales the women described, the colossal ogres that gobbled down Gormak whole and spat out their bones.

The Warmaster suddenly shouted, cried out, "No! I'll kill you!" Madrik saw him roaring a challenge towards the flashing red glow. But then he heard a swoosh of sound, almost a hum. It was a sweet cadence, rhythmic and steady. The sweet scent of blood rose up against the darkening sky, and Madrik could see splashes of ruddy color against the yellowing grass all along the camp's ground at the Warmaster's feet. The Warmaster was fighting with his back towards the crates, so Madrik couldn't at first see the beast. All he could distinguish of the creature was the burgundy glow of its terrible eyes as it illuminated the space in front of the Warmaster.

Then Madrik saw the Warmaster stumble, hard, his knee giving way under the monster's onslaught. That's when Madrik first saw it, saw … her. He saw a tiny framed female, one of the smooth-skinned humans he'd watched from a distance moving along the roads leading from Voss-Ka. Her skin was pale, gleaming in the late afternoon light from the sweat dotting her face and neck. Her head was covered with thick tendrils of dark hair, all bundled against her nape. And her eyes weren't fiery red at all but dark, actually.

The red came from a … club, a stick that she swing before her in smooth beating strokes, driving the Warmaster back and to his knees in front of her. The song he heard came from the stick she was using, its crooning tone singing out over the dusky air to where he crouched, watching. Madrik watched the human stop, breathing hard as the Warmaster knelt in front of her. He said something harsh, because Madrik heard his tone even if didn’t understand the words.

The human smiled tightly, said something in return. Then she reached up and over her head with that terrible stick. She swung it out and around, bringing it towards the Warmaster's neck with precisioned movement. Madrik watched with horror as the Warmaster's head came loose from his body without even a squelch of sound, like a cutting of fat off the end of a haunch cooked over the fire. Smooth and easy.

He froze in place, terrified the human woman might see him. But she didn't look in his direction. She only reached down to remove an item from the Warmaster's corpse. A signet he'd hung around his neck, Madrik saw. She pocketed the item, just as he made out the patters of footfall approaching the crates where he was hiding.

"My lord, I've discovered a supply of neutronium ore. I could package it quickly for transport back to Voss-Ka and then off-world." It was a male voice calling to her, speaking in the dialect common to several humans Madrik had heard over the years. His father had told him they were called "Imperials", whatever that was.

Madrik saw the woman glance over at the crates. He realized, though, she was looking towards someone standing on the other side of the boxes. He saw her smile, thought she was very attractive when she smiled like that. She moved closer, enough that he could hear her reply. "Always looking out for the bottom line, hmm? Very well, Quinn. If you think we can safely transport the materials from out of this camp, by all means."

Madrik heard rumbles of movement, not overly hurried, as the male human gathered up several of the scavenged materials the Gormak had accumulated into a bag he slung over his shoulder. The woman moved much closer, even if she wasn't looking directly at the small space where Madrik was hiding, thank the gods.

"That Warmaster the Voss described took a good swing at you, my lord. Let me see." The male joined the woman suddenly. Madrik glanced at them, there together. The male was larger than the woman, although still slight in comparison to a Gormak. His frame was lean and muscled, in fact. His skin was pale like the woman's, his hair just as dark as hers. But when he glanced around, Madrik could see his eyes were the lightest of blues, like the skin of the hated Voss.

He watched as the man leaned over the woman's side, looking down towards her hip. He made a tsking noise. But she only laughed. "It's nothing, Quinn. Only a scratch. It will surely be healed by tomorrow morning."

He grunted, "It will if I have anything to do with it."

"Well, not if we stand here much longer. We had to climb over dozens of Gormak just to get here. We'll have to wade through dozens more to get back out. I swear, these creatures must reproduce by the bushel-full." She gestured. "Come on, Quinn. Let's take this trinket back to Biddek-Va, so we can get the Bone Pendant he promised us. It's vital we complete our task on this world, I feel it."

"Very good, my lord. Then we'll rest."

"Yes, I do like _resting_ … with you," she sighed.

"We can do that, too."

Madrik almost collapsed into the dust as the two monsters walked off. He didn't understand the playful tones and hidden nuance of language they'd used to communicate with each other. No, Madrik learned something far more crucial as he knelt there in dirt amidst the shattered remains of his camp's strongest warriors.

He learned to hate the Voss passionately, fervently. Because they'd been cowards enough to fight the Gormak behind the monstrous tails of such terrible foes as these humans, these Imperials. These … _Sith_.


	93. Through Your Eyes

"Not again," Quinn muttered sourly from behind her.

Lusiel glanced back at him, saw him scowling down towards the ground. She sighed, shrugging as she turned to regard the figure of Madaga-Ru again. "What do you mean, 'live in my skin, seize control of my body '?"

The Voss inclined his head, in apparent understanding, she thought. "You will feel no pain, I assure you."

Lusiel rolled her eyes, "It isn't pain that I concern myself with, actually. Pain is easily endured."

Madaga-Ru nodded. "I know what you fear."

Lusiel's gaze sharpened into angry focus. She glared at him, "I fear nothing!"

He waved his hand, in a placating gesture. "The Sith fear to admit they can fear, much as any creature does. I understand. I can only assure you I will not harm you. And I will pay you for your service."

"What is it you seek to do with my body?" Lusiel heard a choked noise coming from Quinn, waved towards him for silence.

"You can not know. Agree to this. I only require your body for a few moments."

She contemplated the Voss silently, her arms crossed across her chest. She turned slightly, looking towards Quinn. He stepped forward, inclined his head. She listened to him whisper, "I do not like it, my lord. These … mystics use the Force in ways I've never seen. His intentions can't be trusted."

"We haven't yet seen mystics violate one of their bargains, Quinn. They seem pretty strident about the transactions, in fact. And Madaga-Ru has promised no harm would come of this."

He frowned. "I just don't like it."

Lusiel reached out to touch his forearm gently. "Watch. Tell me exactly what happens." HQuinne nodded, firmly. His gaze remained sharply fixed on her as she returned to her conversation with the Voss.

"Very well, Madaga-Ru. I do like the idea of you owing me, at least."

"The agreement is made."

Quinn glared at the Voss as he stepped closer to Lusiel, his figure luminous with Force power. Until the older Voss seemed to glow with pearly brilliance. He heard Lusiel murmur worriedly, as she turned to look at him. He nodded back at her, stepping closer to her so that she knew he was there, that he wouldn’t leave her there alone.  Magada-Ru noted the protectiveness of the motion, glanced at the Empire man with new interest.

Then the Voss reached out with a hand that glowed a radiant gold, slipping his fingers along Lusiel's neck and then down the swelling slope of her breasts towards her abdomen. He splayed his fingers there, placing his hand firmly against Lusiel's belly. Then he suddenly pressed his hand against her, hard, before seemingly disappearing.

Quinn gasped, almost reaching out to grab at his wife as he watched her back arch and heard her gasp in surprised distress. He called her name as she whimpered. She was afraid, he thought, frantic. Her entire form glowed gold, like the Voss had, shined brightly for several moments. Quinn touched her hand, watched as she turned to look at him with her dark eyes, knew that the being looking at him in that moment somehow wasn't … _her_. He shook his head, whispered, "Lusiel." He saw her – Madaga-Ru, actually - looking at him through her eyes, saw the Voss considering him with all of Lusiel's abilities and his own combined, just in that moment.

Then it was over. The Voss was suddenly standing in front of her once more, even as Lusiel slumped sideways against Quinn. He caught her, smoothed his palms up and down her arms as he tried to revive her quickly. "My lord?"

Lusiel gasped, panted. Then she nodded, glancing at him. "I'm all right, Quinn." She looked towards Madaga-Ru. "I suppose I'll have to continue on not understanding any of this."

The Voss held his hands out to both sides. "It will remain a mystery. Until it no longer is. Then I will appear to you again."

Lusiel clasped the Bone Pendant that Madaga-Ru assured her would act as a key to access the chamber where her Emperor was trapped. Quinn sighed when the Voss backed away from them, disappearing through the side door of his dwelling into the next room so that Lusiel could recover from the ordeal. He looked over at her, "I really don't like Voss, my lord."

Lusiel chuckled. "If it weren't for the Voss, we'd be contending with the Gormak full-bore."

He shrugged. "We contend with them enough as it is. I don't see how much good the Voss are doing us."

"Ah, but the planet is so pretty. I was thinking of buying a summer home, here."

He shot her a sharp censorious look. "Please. Don’t."

She threw her head back, laughing aloud. "Right about now, you're only _hoping_ I'm not serious."

They began walking from the place, Quinn frowning as he followed behind her. They were both silent for several moments. Then Quinn asked her quietly, "You weren't being serious, were you?"

Lusiel almost bent over as she burst out laughing even harder.

* * *

Madaga-Ru watched the Sith leave, her husband following her. He heard her sweet feminine laughter, knew she was calming her husband and herself, knew she was still troubled by the bonding he'd asked of her.

He lowered his head, contemplating all he had learned.

He understood at last how to complete his task, how to destroy Sel-Makor once and for all.

He also understood the Sith far better, the need and impulse towards darkness they contended with.

He knew this Sith called Lusiel was dark, rage-filled and intense, with the briefest glimmers of light still residing in her.

He knew she faced a trial in the days to come, one that might possibly ruin her forever.

He owed her that truth.


	94. Just a little more time

Lusiel found Quinn slumped in a weary heap over a pile of datapads scattered across the desk in the room they were given at Gehn's Outpost, utterly exhausted and apparently asleep. She frowned as she regarded him, there. His eyes were lined with horrible dark circles and his hair was frayed at the ends from where he'd been pushing his fingers through it at regular intervals. Even as he slept he seemed to be troubled, with his brow wrinkled like was in real pain.

_Another_ headache? She thought he might be struggling with persistent nausea, too. She noticed he was rubbing his stomach a lot during recent days, as if his innards were roiling. It bothered her.

She set the bundles she was carrying onto the room's small table, idly noting how strange it was she would be seeking their food this evening. Quinn typically set himself to the task, chased after her diet like it was his own personal mission. And yet he had barely bothered to eat his own meals lately.

Lusiel eased herself down onto the edge of the bed, yanking her boots off before padding across the floor towards her husband. Determined to soothe whatever was upsetting his system, to comfort him. She whispered his name as she laid her hand gently against his shoulder, "Malavai?" Quinn jerked to awareness, hissing in apparent pain as he lifted his head.  Then he leaned himself backwards, curling into Lusiel’s form as she bent over him, and he sighed her name, "Lusiel."

"You fell asleep again. What were you working on? And where exactly do you keep all these datapads when we're traveling, by the way?" She leaned over as if to look at the datapads, but Quinn started. He jumped up, swiping the datapads into a neat, tidy pile to keep her from considering them. "What's the matter," Lusiel chuckled.

"Nothing, my lord. I'm just … trying to work the best, safest route to the Dark Heart," Quinn shook his head, reaching up to grasp the back of his head and rubbed there tiredly.

Lusiel frowned at him, sensing the prevarication. She misinterpreted the impulse, though, "Do you have another headache?"

"No. I mean, yes. It's just not important, I'll use a stim. It's of no concern," Quinn gathered the datapads like he would put them completely out of sight. But Lusiel grasped his elbow, "There's something wrong. These headaches are too common lately."

He looked at her, shrugged, "Perhaps it's Voss itself, my lord. We're close to the Nightmare Lands. Many of the Voss have indicated the place is dangerous."

Lusiel appeared thoughtful. She wasn’t entirely certain why the lands they were traveling in were so saturated in negative energies, only knew it was entirely dark. She had worked only to defend them both from whatever the entity she sensed actually was, rather, "It shouldn't be an issue, however. Murbeck Ghen's shard ritual should work to protect us from its effects."

Quinn only looked away tiredly, "I can't say for certain, my lord. If it’s a Force issue, it will resolve itself once we leave this place, I suppose."

"Damn it, Quinn," Lusiel sniffed.

"I'll use a stim, my lord. Food will help."

Lusiel tapped her fingers against her hip, glancing over at the table where she put the food served at the outpost’s mess. The containers should have kept the meals warm enough, at least. “Fine, then. I brought custard bread and spiced warra nuts. There was rootgrass tea, as well." She heard the gentle hiss of the stim as Quinn applied it, sensed him stepping behind her to reach the table. But she still jumped when she felt his arm slide around her middle to clasp her, so that he could pull her backside flush against his front.

Quinn nuzzled the side her neck just under her ear, sighing, "Why is it I feel so much better when I touch you. Maybe I should just … keep touching you, hmm?"

Lusiel smiled, "I won’t deny your medical expertise in this instance." Quinn chuckled at her teasing tone.

She felt him back up and turned around to face him. He was smiling as he began pulling his clothes off. She reached for the ties of her own robes but he shook his pointed finger back and forth, admonishing her, "No. Wait." So she watched him with wide eyes, as Quinn pushed his coat off his shoulders and yanked his shirt over his head. He toed his boots off but froze when his hands hovered over he fastenings of his pants.

Until she finally grumbled and looked up to see him smiling at her. He crooked his finger towards her, “Your turn. Let me see you. Show me."

She whimpered and spun around so her back faced him, reaching up to untie her hair so it tumbled down to the center of her back in a black fall. She unbuckled the snaps of her armor pieces and he heard them falling one by one, clanking heavily onto the floor at her feet. Then her pants dropped down, sliding along her slim legs into a bundle at her feet. He sighed, how could her blasted _feet_ be so pretty?

Then she shifted, so her dark hair smoothed across the smooth expanse of her back. Lusiel reached around to the back of her neck and lifted her hair up to expose her bare buttocks and spine to him, glancing over her shoulder to look at him.

Quinn was watching her, stroking himself slowly the entire time. She smiled at him wickedly, licking her lips slowly when she saw him and he groaned. He moved backwards to ease himself down onto the bed, still watching as she slowly turned to face him again and he could see her entirely. Her breasts were quivering softly with excited breaths and she shifted gently side to side, easing the growing ache between her legs, he knew.

He didn’t release himself, only kept stroking slowly as he raised up one hand and beckoned to her, watched her walk across the room. She stopped at the foot of the bed, climbed up to kneel on the edge and then crawled up along his entire body. She rubbed her breasts against his feet, his legs, up his groin and abdomen, until she finally straddled him, her thighs clasping his hips on either side. He reached up to cup and fondle her breasts, pulling her nipples softly. Then he lifted up and grabbed one of her breasts into his mouth, suckled her, tongued her nipple. Lusiel threw her head back, moving against him, rubbing her increasingly wet center all along his groin.

She reached back as if to place him at her center but Quinn murmured, "No. Don't. I want you under me, want to feel you … want to surround you, protect you." He had to give her every bit of pleasing, had to care for her pleasure. More than his own, more than anything else right then. He had to take care of her!

He held her and spun them both around, until Lusiel lay back against the bed with Quinn propped over her, his hands balanced on either side of her head. He reached down, grasped himself and rubbed the head softly against her warmth, eased it between the lips of her sex. She sighed as she felt him sliding inside of her, whispered, "Malavai … please."

He smiled down at her, never once took his eyes off her. He reached down, hooked her thighs over his elbows, raising her hips higher to meet him as he began thrusting against her. He ran himself as deep into her as he could reach, before pulling back and then easing forward again. He moved steadily, smoothly, reveling in the feel of her warm muscles against him, the way her cervix clasped his head just as he touched it before moving back again, and the sounds of pleasure and enjoyment she made.

"Malavai … uh, uh … yes …" Lusiel placed her hands against his forearms, grasped him, held onto him as she began rocking her hips towards his movements, encouraging him to thrust harder into her. He groaned, rocking against her faster, shafting her, looking down to watch his hardness as it moved in and out of her, saw it glistening with her essence.

"You're beautiful, Lusiel. Glorious. You feel so good." He whispered, watching her, seeing her breasts bobbing in the light of the dusk coming from the nearby windows. She looked back at him, her eyes gleaming darkly, and he saw the pleasure bloom there, first, in the depths of her eyes, saw them widen and spark with sensation. Then she threw her head back, crying out his name with a loud shout. He kept moving, thrusting. So that she whimpered, "Too much, too much." But he shook his head.

"No. Again. I want to feel you again." He finally pounded against her, the sound of his groin slapping against hers filling the room, loud groans spilling from him. Lusiel moaned, wailed, reached up to dig her small nails into his chest, hard enough she left small bleeding marks there, just as she came again with another wild cry. It was finally enough. Quinn threw his head back, slamming his hips against her before his release shattered him. He shuddered against her, leaned his head down against her shoulder, breathing roughly.

Lusiel lowered her legs to the bed as she caught him against her, wrapped her arms around him and held him. She murmured soft sounds, rubbing her chin against the side of his head. He calmed gradually, soothed. He closed his eyes, drifted. He felt her easing into sleep, made as if to roll off her but stopped when she held him tighter and sighed for him to stay there.

Quinn blinked sleepily, looking towards the desk. He saw the datapads stacked there, breathed out a small groan. He saw Lusiel's soft nipple pucker against his breath and licked it softly, so softly. Then the datapads caught his eye again. He felt a moment of despair, tightened his arms around his wife and squeezed his eyes shut, as if by not looking at the things he might forget.

Because he'd run out of time.

The calculations were ready.


	95. The Dark Heart

_There were no Voss in those long ago ancient days. There were only Gormak, and they stretched across the plains and fields of the world, hunting its beasts and gathering its fruits. Then the Sith came. And the Jedi followed them, determined to halt their plundering of the world's resources. The Jedi taught some of the tribes what it was to use the Force, to manipulate it towards their will. Those people were changed by the Force, becoming a new species. They were not Gormak. They called themselves the Voss._

_And they acted far too quickly, working to expel the Sith from the world. Their anger and their hate served to destroy the Sith who'd come to conquer the planet. But what was left behind as they died was a thing of darkness, a horrible manifestation of the bitter pall that the Voss used to destroy them._

_Over time, it became a thing of will, taking on a mind of its own, this entity, and it called itself Sel-Makor. It came to despise those who'd helped to create it, inspiring in the unchanged Gormak a hatred of these new people, the Voss. So that the two groups waged war, battling across the surface of the world for generations, long enough that the truth of how the fight began was lost._

_But every confrontation strengthened Sel-Makor – every fight fed him, all the suffering empowered him – until even the space where he lived and thrived grew and spread. Those who wandered too close were consumed in its darkness, descending into madness and making Sel-Makor even greater, stronger. Some served Sel-Makor, some manifested him, even. The Gormak and the Voss called his place "The Nightmare Lands" and they stayed far away from him unless driven to approach._

_Eventually the outsiders returned. The Sith attacked Voss, so that their Emperor could seize a Voss mystic to be used as his Voice. Sel-Makor tantalized one of them with promises of power, that the Emperor himself might be seized and controlled, if only he was tricked into approaching the Dark Heart, where Sel-Makor abided. That Sith, the one called Baras - he succeeded, exciting the Emperor's curiosity and sending him to seek out the Dark Heart, where he quickly became trapped, both in the body of the Voss he inhabited and in that physical place, too._

_Sel-Makor tormented the Sith Emperor, contending with him for ultimate control over his powers and his mind. There were many times that Sel-Makor believed he would triumph, that he'd win against the Sith’s Emperor. But his opponent succeeded in calling out. It was only briefly, but it was enough. Because the Emperor's Wrath answered his call._

_She came to the Dark Heart._

 ______________________________________________________________

Lusiel examined the Bone Pendent, turning it over in her fisted hand. She sensed tremendous power and felt driven to reach it. So close, it was so close. Only this last door impeded her from progressing even further into the Heart … She had to get through, to reach the power that still called to her, compelled her ever since Quesh.

There was something else … some feeling? Something – a presence here, that was pleased she couldn't get inside. Something heady and dark. She had never felt anything like it. But it surrounded her like a mist, a smoke. It was everywhere and all around. It was heady, pressing on her. She looked back towards Quinn, regarded him steadily. He looked so tired, so pained still. She frowned towards him, considering. If the dark energies of the place threatened him, it would surely be better if he withdrew now, before he was overwhelmed. Ghen's assurances of safety be damned, she thought. The hermit was half mad when he told her the ritual would work, after all.

Lusiel was determined to protect her Quinn from the dark presence in this place …

But Quinn was already examining the door. "My lord, I believe the Pendant will fit in this depression, here." He smoothed one of his hands along a small hollow in the door, carefully pushing aside several pieces of moss and mold. Lusiel nodded, handing him the pendant. Quinn turned the thing until the pointed edge of its triangular shape was aimed towards the ground, maneuvered it into place, there in the recession. They both heard a click as the pendant was secured and the lock disengaged.

The Darkness pulsed through the Force, snapping angrily at them. A rough voice boomed out against the stillness, shattering it. "Trespasser. Defiler. Sel-Makor warns. Retreat. Relent. Death awaits."

Lusiel shook her head, "No. I am not so easily frightened."

The thing laughed at her. "Then die _easily_."

The door slid back, and Lusiel discerned a spattering of beastly steps, the warbling calls of bitterly angry creatures rushing towards them. Lusiel jumped, firing her lightsaber even as she landed firmly in the doorway. The crimson glow of her weapon illuminated the score of animals gathered in the small, confined space.

They were barely alive, maintained by whatever dark Force compelled them. And they were utterly mad. Just ravaging creatures who’s eyes spun wildly in their huge, thick heads. Their claws clicked and rattled against the stone floor and their fur hung in tattered clumps along their bone-thin forms. Lusiel thought they appeared cat-like, like the crysfangs she'd fought as she came through the twisted forest outside. But whatever they were once before – it was long past what they were now.

The beasts crouched, snarling, and then they leaped at her one by one, desperately driven and compelled to destroy her. Lusiel slashed at them, her lightsaber singing through the dark. She heard Quinn calling out, then there was a steady staccato burst coming from his blaster behind her.

They turned their backs towards each other, settling close to guarding each other as the creatures rushed at them in mass. Animal screams filled the air, snarls and gnashing of teeth, claws scraping and scrambling. Over it all, though, was the steady song of Lusiel's blade and the blaster shots from Quinn’s weapon that punctuated it. Like they blended into a new, heady tune all its own.

Lusiel suddenly laughed, shouting, "Maybe we should keep count. I wager I kill more of them than you."

"You haven't been counting already? I'm up to seven now."

"Hah! I can easily see eight of the beasts lying dead from here."

"Nine, my lord!"

Lusiel laughed again, periodically shouting out a number as the fight continued. They persisted, firm against the onslaught. Until the beasts dwindled and the attacks slowed, gradually diminishing before them. The last of the creatures whimpered, whining in fear and hesitating to leap. But the darkness prodded them, and they leapt frenziedly towards their deaths finally.

Lusiel spun around, crying out happily in triumph. Quinn grinned back at her, stood silently as Lusiel swiped at the blood splattering his neck. She asked him quietly, "They didn't get you, then?"

"No, my lord. But I did manage to get fourteen of _them_."

"Victory really is mine, then. I killed seventeen of the beasts."

Quinn smiled, shrugged. "You'll always beat me."

"Oh, I think you could present me a worthy challenge."

Lusiel saw him frown, his gaze clouding briefly, "I would not want that."

She chuckled slowly, "I can't imagine it ever happening." Lusiel looked around, saw that the moss in the space was glowing dimly, providing light enough she could make out another door in front of them now. Quinn was quiet as he followed her towards the next door. She never noticed how subdued he was. Lusiel was focused, rather, on the increasing presence of that power she first sensed back on Quesh. When she hovered so close to death, when the blood was welling up in her throat – that power called to her even more now.

It was here, she kept thinking. So close. She approached it, entered the room where she knew it was contained.

So damn close. And that's when the figure turned to face her for the first time, its Voss features lighting in heady satisfaction at the sight of her.

It was power beyond words.

Lusiel had descended on several occasions into the hardest reaches of the Force, felt it at its most base level, its purest essence of rage and wrath. She'd once described the experience to her teacher, to Tremel, and he had shuddered as she told him. She told him it was thrilling, like blood pumping, spurting, like the mightiest heartbeat; it was rhythmic, pulsing, throbbing; like the thrusting of a cock into you, hard and strong; like sex at its most exciting; it was driving, compelling; and it was mad, livid, angry, directed, focused; like a blade straight into your gut, steely and hard-edged, _powerful_.

Standing in front of the Emperor and knowing it was him, feeling his power descending over her – to Lusiel, it was nothing like that, nothing like the rage-filled descent she was familiar with and understood. No, this was new and darkly strong; it was almost _more_. This was the darkest edge of the Force, rather. It was that part of the Force so grim, so gruesome and frightening that none dared look at it too long.

It was like dead things rising up again, like monsters that tore at your flesh; it was like disease that ate away your guts, until blood poured from your eyes and nose; it was fearful, horrible, dreadful; like the scariest of tales your mother told you about the shadows beyond the safety of your door just to compel you to stay close.

The Emperor lowered his chin and regarded her, judged her. "Come to me, Wrath." Lusiel bowed down, lowering herself before him. Quinn echoed her motions, his dark head lowering obsequiously. "And so you've pleased me greatly, my Wrath. I will use you appropriately to break Baras and all of his plans, every one of them that sought to keep me trapped here. Like he tried trapping you on that poisoned world, too – together we will show him my own anger at his playing these old games."

Lusiel rose back to her feet, nodding. She would not quaver, not shrink brack from the Emperor’s power. She couldn’t, or she would fail him in striking down those who should. The Emperor smiled tightly, seeing her strength. This one, who was so rich in rage and power, so young and fresh to the game.

He would use her.

Lusiel lifted her chin, swearing, "I will destroy Baras, my Emperor."

"Yes. But first you will release me. Sel-Makor's dark secrets here are of import. But they will wait." Lusiel looked around, concentrated briefly on the markings along the walls, breathed in the scents and wondered aloud, "What are you trying to achieve here, my lord?"

"Ultimate victory."

Lusiel frowned, studying the Emperor's seemingly Voss visage. Victory over whom, Lusiel wondered, suddenly. "I am released only when this body dies. An oversight I will not repeat. But for now, the entity Sel-Makor makes suicide impossible. I will lower my defenses. And use my Wrath to kill this body."

She nodded, obediently, “Very well then."

The Emperor threw back his shoulders, resolutely unafraid. Not of the pain or the damage. Certainly not of her. He only told her, "I am ready, Wrath. Strike me down." That's when the room began to tremble, the ground shaking. And Sel-Makor's voice rumbled again, harsh and rugged, "No! Forever bound!"

"My lord! The Emperor!" Quinn leaped forward, trying to grab the Emperor who remained bound in his Voss form. But the figure was suddenly yanked off its feet and propelled over the length of the room. He hit the ground hard, gasping against the pain. And his surprise was enough, his defenses already lowered in preparation for Lusiel's attack.

Sel-Makor flooded the Voss body. The Voss form slowly levitated, swirling in a mist of black and purple smoke as it jerked and quivered. Lusiel heard the Emperor cry out, and then Sel-Makor was speaking through the Voss, yelling loudly, "Sel-Makor takes this body! Such … power!"

Lusiel faced him mockingly, taunting the figure that still looked Voss. She circled the figure slowly and lifted her lightsaber, jested, "Careful, it's getting crowded in there. Let me help you out!" She jumped towards the figure. But her leap was interrupted suddenly by one of Sel-Makor’s endless avatars. Where did he get these pitiful figures, she wondered.

This one was a pale, scaly Gormak and he raised what appeared to be an actual _sword_ , a real metal sword of ancient design. Lusiel was stunned as the sharp-edged weapon rose over her head, wondering where he'd managed to find such an armament. Her lightsaber went up, met the blade as it swung down against her. Her saber severed the sword into two neat pieces, sending half the weapon spinning off towards the side of the room.

Then Quinn yelled out to her, pointing towards the corners of the room, where portals were opening so more avatars could rush out at them. Lusiel gestured, pointing, "Again, Quinn! Hurry!"

Quinn stepped close behind her, his back towards hers. And again they fought in synchronized motion, defending each other. Lusiel slashed at the Gormak, humming as his stomach spilled smooth intestines across the ragged edge of his ruined sword. She turned without missing a beat even as the thing died, sending her lightsaber in singing rotations that frustrated another avatar's attempts to reach her. She thrust her blade into that one's hard chest, heard it warble a painful wheeze as it died.

One by one Sel-Makor's avatars collapsed against Lusiel and Quinn's solid resistance. Lusiel could feel his hold on the Emperor weakening, heard him yelling frustrated sounds as the two beings trapped within the same body struggled against each other, twitching and pulling.  Sel-Makor tried placing a flimsy circle of dark threat along the floor at her feet, but Lusiel just laughed. She threw her lightsaber at his twisting form in that shaking, trembling body, so that he bent to block her attack and lost concentration in the fight against the Sith Emperor.

Then Lusiel leaped at the figure finally, swinging her lightsaber out and around in a whipping motion of crimson potency, the song of her Force power reaching above her even as she yelled at them both, "Get out!" She twisted out and around the Voss form, then, lashing out against its back, felt her lightsaber plunging into the lower edge of his spine. The Voss collapsed down onto all fours, groaning and wailing and agonized. Lusiel tossed back her head as she felt Sel-Makor's energy dissipating, shouting out in victory when she heard Sel-Makor's angry howl spinning away from the place.

The Emperor looked up at Lusiel through those strange, orange Voss eyes. He watched her, her strength pulsing down at him. Somewhere distant, he watched her and he judged carefully. There in the room, he only nodded, "You’ve done what I asked, Wrath. The life in this body is … ebbing. This will not happen again, not now that I recognize the threat. The Hand will guide you." Blood dotted the Voss lips, and he groaned again, “Go now.”

Lusiel nodded, "I’ll do as you say, master."

"Your time on Voss is done.” The Emperor's Voss body gasped, wheezing. Lusiel watched as he slowly collapsed. She reached out, listening as he coughed hollowly past blood pooling against the back of his throat. Then it spilled out from his mouth. For a brief moment, the eyes looking up at her were truly Voss and large and frightened. Then they deadened.

The Emperor was freed.


	96. Mystics Dreaming

Lusiel argued with the banker, pointing a small finger firmly in his face. "Don't think for a moment I will tolerate any interference with my funds, fool. The buyer of my last shipment of neutronium promised seventy-five thousand credits, to be depositied in my accounts. If even one credit of that amount is removed by you towards some 'transmission fee', as you call it, I'll take it back twice over and from your damn hide."

The Imperial banking representative, a small wiry human with thinning blonde hair actually blanched. Lusiel thought for a moment he looked like nothing more than a walking carcass, all bony and pale. "I'm so sorry, my lord. I assure you there were no fees applied to your accounts. None whatsoever. I swear it." The man's thin fingers flew across his datapad, as Lusiel regarded him firmly.

She nodded, finally. "Good. Because if I have to come all the way back here to find you, I'm not sure I'll be able to stop with just hurting you." Lusiel sniffed as she turned to leave the Voss building where the Imperials housed its banking associates. Several frightened market representatives leaped out of her way as she marched from the place.

Lusiel emerged onto the street of Voss-Ka, breathing in the scents of food coming from the nearby cantina. She heard her stomach rumble as she looked around for Quinn. The sky overhead was glowing with yellow-pink clouds as the sun set, but the shuttle wasn't scheduled to leave the city for several more hours, still. They had time to eat, she thought.

And why was it, she wondered suddenly that Quinn didn't bother so much over their meals as he normally did. He'd taken to skipping meals entirely, even, sometimes eating only after she reminded him of the need. Between that and his headaches, Lusiel was increasingly glad they were leaving Voss.

"You sense the threat, yet you do not act upon it."

Lusiel spun around, taking in Madaga-Ru's golden image, there in front of her now. She frowned at him, "Your sudden appearances and disappearances could prove annoying, you know."

The Voss nodded back at her. "I realize that truth, yes. But I come to pay for what I took, to give you knowledge and a warning." He paced as Lusiel glanced around. She noticed that no one else seemed to find the appearance of a gold, glowing Voss at all unusual. She wondered if she was the only one who could see him. "The Dark Heart is Sel-Makor's prison. I exist to keep him imprisoned there. It is through you that I now understand how to banish Sel-Makor forever."

Lusiel nodded slowly, "Probably a good idea. Although where he ends up could be _bad_ , too."

"Yes, it must be done correctly. If Sel-Makor escapes, all existence is at risk." Lusiel watched as Madaga-Ru bowed his head, troubled. He looked back at her, suddenly firm. "Voss _demands_ payment. You helped, so I'll offer you this secret – be warned. One of your own plots to betray you."

Lusiel stumbled back. _Impossible_ , she thought. Her mind flitted through the possibilities:

Jaesa, perhaps. But not likely. The girl's origins persisted in influencing her.   
Nor would Pierce act without Jaesa's support. He was increasingly bonded to the girl.   
Vette wouldn't even conceive of betraying her, she knew.   
Broonmark was basking in the glory of the kills he was able to make in her name.

And Quinn?

Lusiel's mind immediately skimmed away from that chance.   
Their own bond was too powerful, she believed.

"Tell me which one." Lusiel demanded.

"The vision ends. _You_ must be the interpreter." Madaga-Ru shook his golden head, "Voss bids you farewell."

Lusiel rolled her eyes as he disappeared again. "Fat lot of help you are," she groused. Her stomach grumbled once again. But this time it was a sour, achy feeling. She sighed, looking around for Quinn once again.

Damn it. That mystic ruined her appetite.

She hated Voss.

______________________________________

Quinn leaned against the door of the refresher, weakly holding his stomach and groaning. The smell of vomit filled the small space. He blinked up at the roof, groaned again. He considered tossing his datapad into the disposal along with the vomit he'd already filled it with. But the words there were already imposed on his mind, and no single effort he made to force that door closed, to hide himself away in some other mental space – none of it worked.

" _The ship is located at the attached coordinates. All necessary components are on board. Your calculations have been correctly programed. Bring her. She'll pay the price if you fail_."

The price. Quinn felt his head pounding again, felt himself reeling, as the images of Lusiel trembling in his arms, begging him to protect her from her greatest fear – it all ripped through his mental shields all over again. And again. She would be frightened. Violated. _Hurt_. " _Until there's nothing left, Quinn. Nothing left of her_." Quinn groaned, felt his stomach twisting again. Then he straightened, squared his shoulders.

He wouldn't allow it. He couldn't. He'd promised her. He would not fail her so badly as that. He would keep her safe. He _would_.

Quinn washed his hands and mouth, yanked open the door. The sounds of voices and conversation filled the rooms outside the refresher, and Quinn sighed, rubbing his forehead as he approached the door leading out from the communications center. Several Imperials were gathered near the door, their uniforms marking them as junior officers, each of them excitedly holding onto pads that displayed messages from loved ones, from home. He shook his head towards them wistfully, about to walk out the door. But a Voss woman suddenly stepped into his path.

Quinn stumbled, nearly walking right into her. He recognized her, staring at her red skin with its golden swirls. "Vonna-Xo?"

She nodded. "You remember the Shrine, I see."

"Of course, madam healer. My apologies for nearly bumping into you." He reached out as if to steady her there in front of him.

"It's not important. Only the message," Vonna-Xo stepped closer to him, looking up into his eyes. "You will fail. You will not kill her."

Quinn blinked at her, his gaze suddenly bleary. He swallowed the bile rising in his throat again, "You don't understand. She'll be … hurt, otherwise. There's no other way."

"No. You will fail."

He felt his stomach twisting again, looked around. He was suddenly desperate to avoid vomiting again. "I can't. I can't fail her." The Voss woman reached out, her healing wrapping itself around him so that his stomach stopped roiling.

"The pain ravages you already. It will only become worse. But she will need you." Vonna-Xo continued talking. "After, I mean. You must give her what she needs. Or she will be destroyed."

Quinn shook his head, "I don't understand."

"It is not for me to interpret. Only you can do that."

She slipped away, suddenly. It seemed he only blinked and she was gone. Quinn looked around, noticed that no one had even glanced his way during the entire strange conversation. That's when his commlink began trilling. He shook his head, pulling his link out and watching as Lusiel's image appeared, there. "Quinn? Where are you? I'm ready to get off this blasted world."

Quinn looked around once again, trying to see if he could find Vonna-Xo in the crowd. He sighed, rubbed the back of his head, tiredly. "Of course, my lord. I'm on my way. It's time."


	97. What's Wrong?

Jaesa jerked awake suddenly, lifting her head from the cushion of Pierce's chest to cast her gaze sharply around the room. She snuggled closer to Pierce, tucking her hands against his hard stomach as she listened to the loud thumping of his heartbeat.

"What's wrong?" Pierce rumbled, his voice gruff with disturbed sleep. She glanced up at him and shrugged, the curve of her shoulder smoothing against his ribs.

"I don't know. And that's the problem. Something just feels … wrong. Like there's something here, on the ship. Hiding. Like there's an intruder." Jaesa shuddered softly, felt Pierce's arm drift down across her spine.

"I watched that damn Draahg fellow go up in flames like a tindertwig, Jaesa. No way he's ever getting on this ship again." Pierce clenched his jaw. He still hated the memory of the ship battered, the doors forced wide open, and the crew thrown carelessly into heaps on the docking bay floor. Jaesa'd had a damn bootmark on her back, even, probably from where Draahg had held her down with his fucking foot. A bootmark! If he hadn't already burned alive, Pierce would've gladly given Draahg a bootmark to the fucking balls!

But he had to content himself with remembering how the prick screamed himself hoarse, there in that fire, rather. Not a bad memory, that.

"No. This is something different, not like Draahg. It's more like … like something rotting, or dying maybe. The more time that goes by, the stronger it seems. Like a stench. I'm not sure I've ever sensed anything like it. I know I don't like it." Jaesa had meditated endlessly over the feeling. At first, she thought it was just the lingering effects from Draahg's attack, as Pierce himself pointed out. But the feeling persisted, no matter what she did.

At this point, Jaesa was becoming purely frustrated at her sheer inability even to figure out what the damn sensation _was_. Always so quick to see the good and bad in those around her and suddenly she felt off-kilter, unable to even see what was looming so threateningly over them all. Something was just … wrong. And she couldn't find it, couldn't discern it.

Pierce suddenly lifted his large, meaty arm, and sniffed dramatically against his armpit. "Really hope it's not me stinking up the place. I mean it. I bathe every day!"

Jaesa smirked at him even as she hit him, smacking hard enough against his chest that she left a small pink handprint behind, and he yelped. He snarled, gripping her firmly as he twisted them both around until she was lying on her back with him poised over her. He grabbed her hard behind one knee, yanking her leg up and out of the way, so that he could push himself roughly against her wet center.

"You little bitch. I'll leave you dripping. Then we'll see who smells round here." Pierce sneered down at her. He laughed when Jaesa smacked against his chest again, even as she dug the nails of her other hand into his ass, pulling him closer.

_____________________________________

Vette carefully toed open the door to the bridge, peering inside to see Quinn hard at work against one of the consoles. Behind him, the galaxy map was glowing brightly. She sighed.

She'd watched Quinn throughout the dinner meal earlier, seen him picking at his food even though he waved at Lusiel to finish hers. He really did appear ill, she thought. His eyes were ringed with dark circles and his hair seemed limp against his head, even if every single hair was carefully combed into place. She knew he'd been nauseous, too. He vomited in the refresher right after the holocall with the two creepy Emperor's Hand guys, in fact.

She was confused why no one else seemed to notice that Quinn was in trouble. It all seemed so obvious to _her_. But everyone else seemed intent on their own tasks and work. Or on each other. She frowned, thinking that Jaesa and Pierce needed to get their heads yanked out of each other's pants pretty damn soon. Lord Lusiel would probably need to say something to the both of them. Except she was so damn focused on destroying Darth Baras that she barely noticed anything else lately.

Not that he didn't deserve it, mind you. Cause he did. If she herself could put a blaster bolt in Baras' face, she most definitely would. She might even enjoy it. Although his head was pretty fat, so it might just be gross. Whaddle the Hutt's head had exploded messily all over Tivva when she shot him, and that had been so purely disgusting Vette had puked all over the floor right there in front of his slug body.

At the moment, though, Vette was worried about Quinn. Never thought she'd have to worry about him, though. Quinn probably prepared an annual checklist describing methodical tests and procedures designed to keep him from suffering anything so mundane as an illness, anyway. Then she thought that perhaps this wasn't a _mundane_ illness. What sort of flu virus would be stupid enough to get inside the body of someone like Quinn, huh? That damn bug was likely suicidal, Vette laughed to herself.

Which was why Vette was currently rocking on the heels of her feet in the doorway of the bridge she wasn't allowed to enter. She sighed, finally, and saw Quinn's head skip around to take in the sight of her standing there, holding up a bowl steaming with pukkha broth. Which she knew he had a particular fondness for, mind you. And not that he'd ever said so. But she was able to tell he liked it by how often he asked Tooveee to prepare it.

She was smart like that, Vette smirked. And Quinn frowned, "Vette, you're not allowed on the bridge."

"Blah! I'm not exactly on the bridge, either.”

He sighed, unwilling to engage with her in the regular teasing games she enjoyed so much, "What is it you want?"

"Brought you food, duh. You hardly ate during dinner. And I know you were sick before then. You need something in your stomach, Quinn. Have a busy day tomorrow, don't you?"

Quinn blanched, looked ill again. Vette frowned at him as he swallowed back what was an obvious bout of nausea. "A busy day, yes."

"What the hell's wrong with you, Quinn?" Vette barked the question at him, her lekku twitching against her skull.

"Nothing. Bring me the soup, Vette. I'll eat it," Quinn waved her forward, watched as she approached him with the bowl held out. She was still shaking her head at him, though.

"You're full of shit. I just can't figure out why you're not taking care of whatever the hell's upsetting you. You know, if you collapse in the stupid airlock because you're sick, you won't be able to help Lord Lusiel get this damn signal emitter thing we're going to need." Vette watched him sink into the chair in front of the glowing map as he held the bowl of broth and stared at the map blindly. "What's wrong?"

Quinn blinked. He looked down at the bowl he was holding, raised it up and sipped some of the broth, ignoring Vette's pondering. She canted her head, considering him.

"You're not sick, are you? You're … sad. Why?"

"Vette, I appreciate the broth. It's very good. Can you please return the bowl to the mess?"

"You haven't finished it."

"I can not eat more. Please take it."

Vette accepted the bowl, shaking her head, "Quinn, whatever it is, tell her. You know she'll help."

Quinn lowered his chin, turned his head away from Vette's scrutiny. "I have to protect her, Vette. I'm just not sure I can."

Vette wavered, shaking her lekku back off of her shoulders. "She's the strongest Sith I've ever known, Quinn. Whatever you think is threatening her, she can kick its ass. You have to know that."

"Maybe. But …" Quinn suddenly groaned, clutching his head as pain stabbed against his skull.

"Dammit, Quinn. What's wrong with you?"

He growled at her suddenly, "I don't know! Just stop it! I have a stim I can use, I'll be fine. Just go."

Vette stood straight up, holding the bowl in her blue fingers like a talisman. She glared at the Imperial. "Quinn, you're being an idiot. Fix this problem before you damn well fall over. Stim or no stim, I'll make sure you're stuck in the medical bay rather than compromise our Sith during tomorrow's stupid mission." He watched as the twi'lek spun around, her lekku sailing in a circle, and she marched off the bridge.

He was suddenly proud of her. If his head wasn't pounding so painfully, he would've told her so, even.


	98. Making The Force Bond

Quinn sat in the chair next to their bed, watching her sleep.

She lay facing him, her mouth slightly open. Her lips were pink, plump, and perfect. He thought of the first time he tasted those lips, pulled her lower lip into his mouth to suck against it, and then ran his tongue between them. Her hair streamed in an ebony curtain across their pale pillows. He loved falling asleep with his face buried in that curtain. It always smelled of the sweet fruits that scented her soaps.

He glanced down, took in her form where she'd pushed aside the blankets to expose herself to the coolness of the room. Her breasts were pale, glowing crimson in the dimmed light of the room. Her pink nipples were puckered into soft buds that he ached to suckle. He thought of that day in the medical bay when he first saw them, wanted them. Her breasts rose and fell with the rhythm of her breathing over the tautness of her soft, flat belly. Her hips flared out into the sweetest feminine curve. And there, between her legs, the soft nest of dark curls hid the pink lips of her sex. He thought of what she tasted like, what she felt like, there.

She was the most beautiful thing. She was more perfect than anything in his life ever had been, he thought.

She frowned suddenly in her sleep, made a soft sound of distress. He watched as her hand smoothed across the sheet, knew she was looking for him. He lowered his head, sighed. He waited. She soon settled back into restful sleep again.

He sat there, watching her as the night slipped by towards morning.

When the hour finally approached, he rose and stepped up towards the bed. He leaned over to brush a kiss across her brow, whispered to her softly. "Lusiel, my love. I am yours. Forever." He closed his eyes. He sighed one last time. Then he straightened. He called to her.

"My lord, it's time to wake. We've arrived at the Transponder Station."

___________________________________

The door clanged shut behind them. The sound was darkly ominous. Lusiel frowned as she looked back towards that entrance. Then she returned her gaze to where Quinn was standing in front of her, curiosity lighting her dark eyes. She frowned at his back, how tense he stood there with his shoulders all taut and his head slightly lowered.

What's wrong, she wanted to ask. But something kept her from asking. Maybe it was his own dread, the steadily growing fear in him every step they moved into the ship and never mind how empty the station was, how little resistance they met as they moved forward. She might have called the thing derelict, it was so silent and dead there in space. Not even the minor security team they mowed right over impressed her. There just was no reason for Quinn to be so … what was he worried about?

She glanced around the room, taking in the crimson lights that illuminated the circular space, the machines lining the walls. Was she missing something? Some threat?

Then Quinn turned around. Lusiel looked into his eyes, saw the iced gaze he gave her, the dying expression on his face. The deliberation of his expression. She stopped, staring at him. No, _everything_ stopped and she knew. " _Be warned. One of your own plots to betray you_." No. Not this. Not _him_. She felt herself sliding, felt coldness slipping into her blood. It rushed at her blindingly.

She suddenly felt like she was trapped in that harsh white place, the cell where that mad alien was imprisoned on Belsavis. Where nothing could be seen, known or understood, where everything that once held meaning was just … gone.

"My lord. I regret …" She watched him swallow. He tried propelling his voice louder, tried, "I regret that our paths must diverge. Out of respect, I knew it had to be me here. I have to watch."

She shook her head, quickly. Almost jerking. The dark tendrils of her hair against the side of her head twisted in her distress. She barked at him, "Speak plainly, Quinn. Say it! Say every word."

His eyes went stark. The look he gave her could have been carved from that white place. It was hard and cold. It was _cruel_. "Baras has always been my master. He sent me to your ship, bid me serve him all this time. I've been his loyal servant all along.” Quinn swallowed roughly. But he kept going, he told her, “And he's asked that you be killed. This entire scenario -- all of it, the supposed martial law and the signal emitter? It was a ruse designed to bring you here where you could be killed."

Why are you saying that, she wondered madly. She knew it wasn't true. Her mind flew frantically, trying desperately to make sense of what he was talking about. Because there was none! There was no reason to it. It simply made no sense, flew in the face of everything she had considered, watched and listened to. Her brother’s logical reasoning back on Nar Shadda, even, “ _Only a truly stupid Imperial would lose such an opportunity for advance; he’ll love you for that much alone. Then he’ll_ know _you, too. No, he won’t give you up, not easily_.”

Quinn hated Baras. She knew it! She knew he acted despite Baras’ instruction and insistence! What was going on, here? Had she been foolish? Had she missed something?

Her mind flew through memories, moments, events over the course of the past year. She thought in agitated motions, wildly running through every damn thing he'd said and done. Where could she have gone so wrong?

And the words spilled from her before she could stop them.

"I thought … I thought this was real. That you cared. I thought you loved me. But … I don't understand this." She felt tears prick at her eyes, real tears. When was the last time she cried, she suddenly wondered. She was six, maybe. Eight? Did she cry when she killed that bastard tester? Or was it when she watched her mother kill her father?

And _that's_ when Quinn flinched.

He tried to hide it from her but he didn't move fast enough, didn't turn away quickly enough. And she saw it, saw the raw, visceral pain he was trying so hard to obscure. He was hurting. He was _hurting_! Her senses screamed it, like a blazing path of fiery rage-filled understanding. The Force practically shouted to her … _He doesn't want to do this_. Then why?

"He's forced my hand. I must side with him." Quinn stared at the far wall. He almost stumbled in place, straightened again without turning back around.

_Forced my hand_.

Forced!

Hoth. Draahg.

Quinn's face covered in blood.

Hours before she returned to the ship.

Baras, you son of a bitch.

The understanding burst over her, like fuel over a fire.

_"_ _You’re not fool enough, that you don't realize how deeply compromised by Darth Baras the Imperial surely is. You said he served Baras for years, after all. Do you think Baras has not used that time to sink his teeth into him? No, Lusiel! It's the only way_ _!"_

_"A Sith who loves is vulnerable. You either eradicate the weakness. Or you make it stronger."_

_"_ _If you depend on the customary order of your ways, he’ll know how to defeat you, then. You must challenge_ yourself _, too_ _."_

_"Why haven't you already saved him? You haven't done what needs doing. You're scared! You're too late! Baras has already acted!"_

_"You've read the journals, the text. You know what you have to do!"_

_"It was a journal, master. Written by some minor Jedi. I've never even heard of her, in fact."_

_"It's the only way!"_

_"The only way!"_

Weeks, damn him!

That's all that Lusiel could think of as she stood there, trembling with angry rage. All she could see in her mind's eye were the endless weeks in which Quinn suffered. All the times he clutched his head from the pain. All the times he struggled just to eat. All the times he couldn't sleep.

He'd worried, agonized. Baras made him afraid; he hurt him. Baras _tortured_ him. And all of it right there in front of _her_. She had watched him suffer, knew it and didn’t stop it, didn’t save him! She had failed him - _failed_ her husband beyond measure. She had left him to fight alone, against the power of a fucking Sith, unable to truly contend with the man's power, incapable of saving himself from it. It was her responsibility to ensure he was safe from it!

Lusiel reeled.

Especially as she considered the pain he would endure in these next moments.

She might kill him.

She might destroy him utterly.

She almost vomited right there on the floor at his feet as she thought of it.

All of them had told her, warned her. Even a damned Jedi sensed the truth of it!

And. She. Had. Still. _Failed_.

She should have done it months earlier, just as Tremel had told her.

She began to seethe with potent, mind-blowing rage.

Damn you, Baras. I will make you pay for this in ways you can not begin to imagine. I will drag you before the Council, parade you in ignoble defeat. I will ruin you. I will humiliate you. And I will hate you forever! When my dreams are achingly dark and lonely, I’ll see you and still _hate_ you there, too! Damn you! May you writhe in agony in the deepest, darkest depths of the Force’s void, where agony and misery dwell, where cruel things hide and wait for victims! May they feast on you forever!

She simmered. She didn't care anymore. None of it mattered. Not even when Quinn continued to lie and lie, his mouth spilling threats and insults. Because he couldn’t stand to see her hurting and wanted her to rage. Because her anger was easier to face than her pain. Because he loved her and thought he couldn’t save her any other way.

None of it mattered. Not his droids, even if Quinn's programming proved exceptional. Not even his supposed plans for her people, because he didn’t believe he would survive this moment. Or he believed they would kill him once he told them what happened. He rather wanted to die just then, if only to stop the pain in his gut. It just didn’t matter!

No. The only thing she wanted right then was to end the entire debacle. She wanted it _over_. She wanted to fix this, get him safe again. She would do what needed doing right now, and then no one – no Sith, _ever_ – would be able to do this to him again. It was all that she wanted and cared about right then. Just saving him. The way she should have saved him earlier.

She had failed him. She wouldn't fail him one moment longer.

_My Malavai_ , she thought. I'm so sorry.

Her wrath was beyond intense, incredibly powerful. She actually welcomed the droids when they marched into the room, if only because she finally had something to bash against in her rage. Hell, her initial leap towards the first droid actually worked to cave in the thing's front casing! She heard the crunch of its metal surface, the rip of its inner wiring. The whining drone of its machine workings sparked and sputtered to a halt. Then Lusiel screamed a forceful shout towards the second droid, fueling the cry with all of her raging anger. The droid actually levitated off the ground from the power of the shout, kicking its three powerful legs futilely in the air. Lusiel spun against the thing, whipping and lashing it with her lightsaber until it collapsed in a metallic heap, all of its legs spinning away towards the corners of the room.

But she kept battering against it, bashing it over and over again. And screaming, screaming! “Damn you! Damn you! I hate you, hate you! I will kill you for this, you bastard! You. Fucking! Bastard! I hate you!” Until there wasn’t anything left but a broken, smoking heap of twisted metal all covered by slash marks, thick dents, and scratches. She wanted it to be Baras!

She spun around and looked at Quinn through blazingly fiery eyes, made black from the sheer, raw force of her feelings. He was staring at the droids she destroyed in simple moments, blinked dazedly with shock, "My calculations were so precise." He stumbled, "I can't … Lusiel, I can't let him hurt you."

She shook her head as she marched towards him. Her lightsaber burned scarlet against her side as she moved like a cat across the room and perspiration dotted her brow. She lowered her eyes into narrow slits. Quinn raised his blaster, his eyes glazed. She raised her saber in front of her, "Don't. No, Malavai." He flinched when she said his name, and he fired. The bolt went wild. Hardly like her captain to _miss_. He was such a practiced shooter, aiming at targets in the hold of her own Wing at every chance.

But he fired again, and this time Lusiel had to raise her lightsaber to deflect the bolt. It spun towards the ceiling. He snarled when she took another step towards him, yelled at her, "Damn it, Lusiel! He'll hold you down and I won’t be able to stop him from hurting you. There’s no other way!" She froze and stared at him, her pink lips pursed. Of course that’s how he did it … Fucking Baras, she thought. Quinn murmured at her sadly, "I promised you."

Then he lashed out hard, surprising her with the dagger he kept at his side and only rarely used. He sent it spinning in an arc at her vulnerable belly, towards that soft place where her breastplate and leg armor didn't quite meet. She leaped backwards but she wasn’t fast enough.

There was a burning lash of pain across her stomach, as Quinn’s dagger opened a neat, thin slice from one of her hips all across her abdomen towards the other. She yelped out a shocked sound when she felt the blood spurt up against her belly. In purest defensive reaction, she brought her lightsaber up and out, whipping it against Quinn’s side. But she pulled back at the last possible second, just to keep from cleaving him in two. Her saber still glanced across his vulnerable left side and he cried out, clutching his side as dark red blood welled and spilled over his fingers.

"Malavai!" She yelled his name, reaching towards him wildly. But he waved her back, shaking his head. He glanced down her body, saw rivulets of her blood dripping steadily onto the armor covering her legs. So much, he thought. She was bleeding! He blindly reached into his medical bag, trembling in pain. He heard her whimper his name again.

"Hush, Lusiel," he muttered. He quickly programed the necessary instructions into one of his medical gadgets, watched it whir into action. He saw it spin on course towards her belly, shooting kolto in a fine mist across her wounding, there. He looked up and met her eyes, then. He blanched again, cursed. "Gods."

" _Your_ wounds, Quinn." She pushed the small medical probe away from her, angry again.

"My lord? What? I … I tried to kill you, my lord. I don't really … need healing."

"Do as I say, Quinn. Now."

He nodded wearily. He quickly prepared a second probe, stared at it as it whirred against his side, spitting green kolto at him. He watched it, because it was easier than looking at her, "I betrayed you, Lusiel. There is nothing I can say that will ever make up for it, or ever convey how sorry I am." He hung his head, unwilling to look at her. To see that she hated him now. He had failed her so totally, he thought.

"Malavai?"

He looked up. She was watching him, her eyes rich and dark with unshed tears. She ran her eyes over him. He was still in pain, leaning roughly against his wounded side and barely standing. Dark circles rimmed his gorgeous blue eyes. He was pale and tired; he looked like he hadn't slept in years. His dark hair was mussed and unkempt. To Lusiel, he had never looked more wonderful. He was alive, his eyes morose but shining over at her.

_"It's the only way!"_

She told him, sadly, "This will hurt so much, Malavai. I'm sorry."

He frowned. Then he felt himself picked up. He flew back forcefully into the nearby wall. He hit the thing with a loud and terrible bang, his head flying back and smacking against the wall with an incredible thump. He moaned, looked over at Lusiel. She raised a hand towards him. Her dark eyes were glittering. Was she crying? _Don’t cry, Lusiel._

That's when he felt the most agonizing pain spear his head. He gasped a loud, shocked sound as the sensation took hold. It felt like someone had split his skull in two so that they could root around in his brain. With razors. The agony ripped through him. He threw his head back against the wall, and he screamed. He screamed and screamed. He kicked madly, trying to get away, tried to raise his hands to reach his head and stop whoever was tearing apart his brain, his mind.

He heard her, then. Like a whisper, like a calm. Like she was right there next to his ear. But she was in the middle of the room, wasn't she? He screamed louder. She kept whispering. How could he hear her whispering? _"I almost have it. I'm right here. Please. I promise it will be all right."_ Ripping, breaking. He felt her reaching deep into his mind to yank against something hard and cruel there, pulling, pulling and tearing, ripping it out of his mind. The agony was intense, terrible. He kicked futilely, screaming hoarsely.

_"Please … Malavai. I love you. I'm so sorry."_

He heard her _in his head_.

Then everything went black.


	99. Telling What Happened

Pierce was standing with both his thick legs braced firmly and leaning back against the wall of the engine room. His big hands were wrapped around Vette's thighs as he held her high over his head so she could reach some of the pipes running along the curve where the ceiling met the wall of the ship. She ran the arc welder back and forth over the section, carefully installing a piece of new piping precisely where it was required.

"I might be a bit perturbed by the sight of you holding another woman's thighs, Pierce."

Pierce twisted his head around to take in the sight of Jaesa perched in the doorway of the engine room. He grinned at her, "Hey, you might be able to use some of that nifty Sith magic to keep the twi'lek up in the air, actually. Wanna try?"

"Don't you dare, Pierce! Dammit! No!" Vette squealed as she felt herself held up by an unseen Force, before she slowly started spinning. "Bastards! I hate you both! Argh! Come on! I know where you both sleep, damn it!"

Jaesa giggled as she slowly lowered Vette back down to the floor, "You were finishing up, right?"

"Don't you ever do that to me again!" Vette waved the arc welder in Jaesa's face. Her lekku twitched and shook in agitation. Jaesa started to chuckle again but then she heard an angry Talz warbling sound, low and threatening. She gulped, looking around with frantic concern. Then she suddenly launched herself, raising her robes in one hand as she spun out of the engine room.

Vette started yelling as she chased after her, "No, Broonmark! No hurting the Sith Apprentice! Don't!"

Within moments, the ship was full of the sounds of stomping feet and shouts galore. Jaesa kept running in circles, terrified that if she stopped the Talz would leap out of his invisibility and grab her. Pierce only kept leaping around and waving his arms as he tried to find Broonmark himself, yelling the entire while, "Don't you dare hurt her, you damn furball!" And Vette jumped up and down in the middle of the lounge, trilling, "Broonie! Come here, come on!" Even Toovee kept whining, although no one listened to what he was actually saying. Something about blood on the floors and how difficult it was to clean up.

Broonmark suddenly twinkled into view. Everyone stopped, staring over at him in amazement. The Talz was leaning against the wall next to the hallway leading down towards the airlock. He was bent over, making funny huffing noises. Vette glanced over at Pierce, "Hey. I think he's laughing."

Pierce scowled at the white-furred Talz, "Damned right he's laughing."

Jaesa stomped her foot. She raised her hands up, "I'm going to kill it!" Vette leaped in front of Broonmark, her blue arms held out quite dramatically, "No, you can't! He's my only hope for sanity on this ship where I'm surrounded by crazy Sith and demented Imperials!"

Jaesa rolled her eyes. "Oh, shut up, Vette."

Vette grinned back at her. "Well, you gotta admit. We probably looked pretty damn funny."

Jaesa eyed the Talz, who was still huffling as he glanced over at her. The creature still seemed purely amused as he leaned back against the wall. Jaesa sniffed, "Well, maybe Pierce looked funny."

"Hey!" Pierce frowned at her. But then Broonmark straightened and turned around to face the airlock doorway, whistling a warning call, "Trouble." That's when the airlock door suddenly banged opened and Lusiel stumbled inside dragging a barely conscious Quinn with her, his head lolling against her shoulder.

Vette trilled a cry of alarm, leaping around the Talz to help grab the captain's limp arm. "Shit! I knew he was too sick to go with you today!"

________________________________________

Quinn could feel himself trembling, knew he was lying prone on a hard surface. He drifted in and out of awareness. He felt someone probing against his wounded side, moaned. He heard voices. "There's no bleeding. I don't understand why he's unconscious. Did he hit his head, or something?"

That was Vette, he thought. His head hurt. He vaguely remembered hitting it against the wall. Did he crack his skull?

"Jaesa. You have to check him. Make sure …" Lusiel's voice. She was trembling, too, her voice was shaking. He wanted to touch her, soothe her. Was she still bleeding? Gods, no. He had made her bleed. He whimpered from the pain of it. "Jaesa, I'm not sure his mind survived."

_"Please be all right. Please. I need you. I love you. Please."_ He clenched his eyes, confused. He didn't understand. Why could he hear her whispering when her voice kept sounding from the opposite side of the room?

He heard Jaesa gasp. Because she was right beside him, right next to Vette. They must have carried him inside. He tried opening his eyes but it hurt too much. He moaned again as shards of pain drifted through his head. His head hurt so badly! Jaesa was leaning over him, whispering soothing sounds, softly calling his name. "Quinn? It's me, can you hear me, Quinn?"

He felt her Force abilities smooth across his mind. She was probing at him, judging him. She was trying to _see_ him. He whimpered, afraid. Not in my head, not again. That's when something in his head, something new and alien, but utterly familiar to him at the same time – whatever it was, it shifted into dreadful awareness. It sat up and watched Jaesa's motions, considered them for threat. It growled softly in warning. Quinn sensed Jaesa responding, heard her whisper next to his ear, "Yes, I see you, master. Now, let me find him. I’m only looking for him, I won’t do anything else.”

_"You can't hurt him."_ It spoke to her, warned her. It threatened her, hung there implicitly. Hurt him, and I hurt you is what it said to her. Quinn was confused, he writhed across the medical bed. What is that thing, he wondered.

"I will never hurt him, I swear it," Jaesa said aloud.

Quinn was confused, hurting. He was so tired. He started to drift away. But Jaesa called to him then and that awareness settled back so that she could finally see him. He felt her ability move against him, regard him. It was all in his mind, right? He shied away from her touch, rememberd the harrowing pain of the last time someone touched his mind. It hurt! Don’t hurt me anymore, he wanted to scream, wanted to fight. He glared, snapped away from the touch, then he remembered her bleeding. He made Lusiel bleed, and he twitched, moaning.

Jaesa was talking aloud, towards Lusiel apparently. Quinn wanted to see her, look at her. Is she still bleeding, he wanted to ask. "He's in tremendous pain, master. He feels … guilt? He's so concerned for you. Are you bleeding? Yes! He’s aware, master! He understands!"

Quinn heard Lusiel release what sounded like a sob. Don't cry, he thought. Please don’t cry, Lusiel. He wanted to go to her but he hurt too much. Then he heard Vette say something about the blood on her stomach, "Oh, gods! You’re bleeding so much, my lord!" He whimpered, guilty. He felt so much remorse. He drifted, tired. Everything went away.

________________________________________

"He's only sleeping, master."

Lusiel nodded, pleased for the first time since she'd leaned over Quinn after he dropped down onto the floor unconscious. She had cried as she searched him for a pulse, for a breath, begging him aloud to just be alive. Then finding it, feeling a puff of breath against her cheek as she leaned over him, and frantically trying to get him back to the ship, carrying him as much as she was able and using the Force to hold him up otherwise, hearing him moaning against her neck as they went along.

She was suddenly exhausted, so tired she wanted to just curl up on the floor right there and go to sleep. Vette turned to her, nodding towards her stomach, “Oh, gods! You’re bleeding so much, my lord! We need to stop it."

She looked down at the blood still dripping down onto her leg armor, lowered her head, "Help me, Vette." The twi'lek moved towards her, began unbuckling her armor and pulling it free. Her shirt was shredded in a line where the dagger had cut. Vette prodded the area, waving towards Toovee for a kolto salve that they both spread thickly across the laceration.

"Who cut you like this? I can't imagine you letting anyone close enough to pull it off," Vette muttered as she worked bent over Lusiel's abdomen. She had battled alongside Lusiel enough to know how adept the Sith was at keeping enemies at bay.

Lusiel was too tired. She only replied dazedly, "Quinn." Because of course she wouldn’t stop Quinn from getting so close to her.

Vette gasped, looking up at her with shock in her eyes. Pierce, still standing frozen just inside the door to the medical bay, growled angrily, "What the fuck do you mean he _cut_ you?"

"Baras compromised him. It was a trap. It was all a trap, and Quinn lead me straight to it," Lusiel explained, tiredly. Her shoulders were drooping. She only stared at Quinn where he lay silent and unconscious on the table. He was so quiet, not like when he screamed before. He screamed so loudly! She sighed raggedly, hearing the echo in her mind.

Pierce suddenly growled, tramping further into the room like a rampaging Nerf bull, "Should just toss him out the airlock now, my lord. Long as he's alive, we're all at risk. He's dead weight." He was sneering at the unconscious captain, looked more than prepared to stomp straight across the room and grab him to carry to the airlock right then and there. Jaesa shook her head as she stood next to the table where Quinn was laying, held her arms out as if to block him. But then Vette gasped and Pierce looked over at her, caught sight of Lusiel then.

The Sith Lord was glaring at him. Her eyes were hard and dark, like ebony-colored volcanic rock, fiery and dangerous. She stalked towards him and he swallowed nervously, even as he held his head up to meet her. She sent her fist flying into his face, hit him as he'd seen her hit countless enemies, the Force flying through her clenched fist so that it smashed into the side of his face. Like a fucking brick! He felt blood spurt into his mouth, felt two teeth come loose, and he bent over to spit them out onto the floor.

He came to rigid attention before his angry Sith Lord, ignored her trembling in front of him and watching as she fought to regain control of her temper before she caused him further damage. He waited, didn't even wipe the blood off his chin. Then she threw her shoulders back, pointed a small finger hard into his armored chest and jabbed him harshly, "The next time you ask me to kill Quinn, I'll destroy _you_. Don't you ever dare to question me!"

Pierce nodded at her, staring over her head solemnly, "Noted, my lord. Won't happen again. I swear it."

Lusiel spun around. She glared at all of them as they stood frozen in place around the small medical bay. She clenched her fists tightly shut, "Baras is to blame for this! Do you hear me? Had it been any of you he stuck his filthy mind twisting fingers into, you would've been the ones out there on that Transponder Station waving a blaster in my face! No! It will be fucking Baras that pays for this; I will make sure of it! And if any one of you for a moment even disrespects Quinn for being the one Baras tormented, it'll be your damn limbs I use as a club when I go up against the bastard!” She breathed in hard, “Do you understand me?"

They all nodded. Jaesa vowed, firmly, "Baras will pay, my lord. We'll _all_ see to it." Vette was emphatic, patted Quinn’s unmoving hand, "Son of a bitch thinks he can hurt our captain. We’ll get him." Broonmark clicked his claws together, "Tried taking Sith mate. Punish the bad one."

Lusiel rubbed against her stomach, where her skin still smarted and burned painfully. She heard Pierce shift behind her, looked at him over her shoulder, still angry. He raised a large hand, slowly placed it on her shoulder. He cupped her shoulder, squeezed comfortingly, "Sorry, my lord. I'll move Quinn to your quarters, let him rest. He'll come to no harm while I can prevent it. Not ever, I swear it."

Lusiel glanced back down at her husband, gazed at him, at the darkness tinging the skin around his eyes, the pinched expression of his mouth. He was _still_ hurting, dammit. She nodded finally, "See to it, lieutenant. Toovee, finish with this damn healing. And Vette? Take us to Nar Shaddaa."


	100. Drunken Considerings

"You're drunk." His voice sounded harsh. Lusiel blinked up at him, wobbled a nod in his direction. Yep, she wanted to tell him. I am sooo drunk! But he snapped at her before she could get the words out, "Get up!" He grasped her arm and yanked her out of the chair when she couldn't even stumble to her feet and stand. She felt him start pulling her from the cantina, as her sight went hazy from the bright, garish lights that just kept pulsing away all around her. She groaned and rubbed her temple.

"Don't you dare vomit on my boots, Lusiel. Damn you for being an idiot, a mere acolyte could take you down right now. What were you thinking?" He continued to berate her, albeit quietly, every step they took staggering across the Promenade. He practically threw her into the taxi vehicle, climbing in behind her as he toggled in the direction and then settled back against the seat to glare at her. She only watched the lights of the city flying by as they traveled, blatantly ignoring his muttered complaints about her incredibly unwise bout of public intoxication. He even waved a cybernetic finger in her face at one point, which she yet again blatantly ignored. She even yawned widely.

They arrived at the posh Club Vertica in far too short a time for her comfort. She would've gladly sunk down into the seat of the taxi and gone to sleep, anyway. Instead, she was unceremoniously hauled out of the vehicle so that nearby casino patrons could catcall and whistle towards Tremel, congratulating him on his good luck in finding such a "hot piece of ass". She tugged her pale pink skirt down as she waved back at them and giggled up into his tight expression. He scowled and hissed a low, angry warning, "Not one word, Lusiel. Shut. Up."

She was drunk. Not stupid. She shut up.

He proceeded to march through the casino doors and up the stairs, pulling her behind him. She watched the people as they went along, saw several gambling tables with customers lining the edges, some cheering, most crying out sympathetically to each other. A Mon Calamari suddenly leaped up onto the surface of one table, yelling out, "I did it, I won, woo hoo!" He started waving his fishy arms over his head, obviously excited. Lusiel wanted to cheer back at him but she was afraid she would be sick. So she only laughed, giggling as a Wookiee yanked the fish-man back down into his seat. Tremel rolled his eyes, "For pity's sake, Lusiel."

They staggered up the stairs and made towards a door on the far end of the hallway. Lusiel saw a group of Republic soldiers down the way at the other end of the hall, in front of a different door. She frowned, pointed "What's that?" Tremel grunted, "They're investigating some sort of disturbance that took place there several months ago. Something about Mandalorians. Come along."

Tremel yanked her into his room and banged the door shut. She leaned back against its surface, watching him march across the room to throw himself into a chair near the window. He leaned his elbows onto his upraised knees as he regarded her angrily, "Do you have any idea what might have happened? Lusiel! There are people who depend upon you! You can not afford to let your guard down! Not ever! Damn it, what would Khy say if he'd seen you out there?"

"Oh, no! He wouldn’t have stayed there, not Khy. He’s so much smarter than I am. No." Lusiel held up a hand, "Please, Tremel. I … I know I failed." She wilted back against the door, her chin quivering as she fought back tears. Tremel’s gaze sharpened. He jumped to his feet, moving swiftly across the room to grip her arm again and pull her towards a nearby sofa. He pulled her with him as they collapsed onto the cushions, so that she ended up huddled against him, sniffling.

"Stop treating me like a child."

"Shut up. Indulge me. I miss my daughter sometimes."

"I killed her, you know."

He shrugged, "She would've killed you otherwise. Then I would've missed _you_."

"I'm not your daughter, you skinny bastard."

"Well, I like you anyway."

They sat there quietly for several minutes. Lights from outside flashed spectacularly through the windows, the advertisements promising adventures and pleasures galore. She hated Nar Shaddaa. Well, maybe not that last time she was here. She'd rolled with Quinn across the bed that night. They weren't able to decide who would end up on top, as she recalled. She sighed.

"What's happened, then?" Tremel asked, finally.

"I waited too long. Baras … he used him before I did it. Like you said."

Tremel sighed, "He's dead, then?" But Lusiel shook her head.

"No. He survived. His mind's intact, even. He's in some kind of shock, though. He's mostly slept ever since, only woke briefly last night, long enough to drink some of the broth Vette forced down his throat."

Tremel lifted her away from him, turning to look her in the eyes, "He survived? Are you serious? Lusiel, this is incredible! Are you certain he has no sort of force sensitivity?"

She rolled her eyes. "He was tested as a youngster, Tremel. I told you! Khy found the test results personally and I reviewed them. He’ll never be Force sensitive."

Tremel shook his head. He was stunned, "I don't believe it, then. Something was missed. We rarely understand how the Force works through various individuals. I think he has more potential than even you've given him credit for." Lusiel’s mind was spinning slowly, though. Probably from the drink.

She stared at him, "Do you mean you told me to do it, when you thought for sure it would kill him?"

Tremel shrugged, "He was an obvious threat, to you and your crew. Of course I told you to do it." Lusiel clambered to her feet, only wobbling a little bit as she began pacing angrily. Tremel shook his head as she went back and forth. "There are times you really do remind me of my daughter, Lusiel. Such fierceness!"

"You had no right, Tremel!"

"Right? Which one of us was proved right in the end, hmm?" He watched her stumbled to a stop, staring at the wall as her chin wobbled again. He sighed, "You must come to terms with this, Lusiel. You did the best that you could."

"You didn't see him. I should've done better."

"That point is moot. What you need to concern yourself with is where you go from here, rather."

She looked over at him, squared her shoulders. "The Hand is sending us to Correllia."

"Battle, then." Tremel sighed, shaking his head, "You're not prepared. Your song is dulled. If you try to fight as you are right now, Lusiel, you'll fall."

"I have no choice, you know that."

"I know you have to regain your balance, in fact."

She clenched her hands into fists, "How the hell am I supposed to do that? Every time I close my eyes, every time I stop long enough, all I can hear is how loudly he screamed when I invaded his mind.."

Tremel leaned forward, intent. "Force bonds take on many forms. I told you, to create one required pushing him to the point of death. It was the only way."

"He screamed!"

Tremel shrugged. "I'd imagine it hurt quite a bit, yes."

"Shut up. I hate you."

"That's fine." He cocked his head towards her, shooting her a curious look, "What's it like?"

Her eyes darkened. She looked feminine suddenly, thoughtful and far away. "I can hear him if I stop and concentrate. He's … dreaming."

"It's constant, then?"

She paused. Her brow crunched into a frown as she considered, "It was strongest when Jaesa probed his mind. It seemed to move, almost like a cat stretching out its paws. And I know it threatened her."

Tremel nodded, "It's you but distinct from you, as well. It would have to be. It's a part of yourself left behind in him. It will grow so much stronger the longer it persists and shapes itself.” He canted his head sideways, “You found what Baras inflicted on him?"

She nodded. Outside the far windows of Tremel’s posh rooms, one of the looming advertisements drifted along its slow course. Lusiel considered its blinking shape softly, "Yes. It was deep. It reminded me of mud, like what you trek into the estate after rushing around outside. Seemed to take forever to root it out."

"But it _is_ gone now?"

"Of course it is. Like I'd leave even a speck of that son of a bitch to rot there in his mind. Gods, I hate Baras! I'm going to so enjoy killing him."

Tremel chuckled. "You're such a woman, Lusiel. Such jealousy you demonstrate. Such possessiveness."

"I failed him, Tremel." Lusiel bit her lip, shaking her head sadly.

He raised his chin, glowering at her. "Get over it, my lord. There's no time to pout or sulk."

She glared back. "Why didn't I just kill you when I had the chance?"

He shrugged sagely, "I never understood it, either, trust me."


	101. Waking Up

Quinn opened his eyes slowly. The last time he woke, Vette had been nearby and offered him something to eat. But this time she didn't bound into his view. The ship was quiet, actually. There was only the hum of the ship's engines, the gentle glow of the night time lighting in the room. He shifted against the cushion of the bed. That's when he became aware she was lying there next to him.

For one single moment he thought it had all been a bad dream. Just a nightmare, that he could set aside and forget about. But then his side tinged painfully as he pulled against the healing that hadn't yet finished. He was going to wear that scar forever, he thought sadly. Well deserved, that.

She was breathing. He could feel the warm push of her breaths against his shoulder. Every so often she loosed a small sigh as she continued sleeping, too. She was pressed up against him, her bare skin warm and soft where she was touching him all along his side. Gods, he loved her.

He turned his head away, looked at the far wall and he blinked. He didn't deserve such a precious moment, so he refused to savor it. He climbed free of her warmth, stumbling to his feet. He wavered softly, then he sighed as he moved towards the closet and began pulling on a uniform. He settled down into the chair he occupied during the night before … what did he call it, he wondered? His mistake? His stupidity?

But he only shook his head now and yanked his boots on, before rising back to his feet and headed towards the door. Without looking back at the bed where she remained sleeping, he stepped out and shut the door behind him.

Toovee whined from his regular stance at the other end of the lounge, startling him, "Good evening, captain. And may I say you're looking much better since the last time I saw you. Are you in need of assistance?" Quinn eyed the droid. Toovee was decked out in what looked to be a coat of some kind. It was a bright cherry-pink monstrosity of a garment. He wondered where Vette managed to locate it. Where were they, in fact? "How long have I been … sleeping, Toovee?"

"You have been resting for forty-three hours and thirty-six minutes, captain. Lord Lusiel was quite adamant that you not be disturbed. Although when she left the ship, she did instruct Mistress Vette to monitor you."

"She left the ship? Where exactly did she go?"

"I was not made aware of her destination, captain. She returned approximately seven hours ago, however. She obtained a stim from the medical bay and entered her quarters shortly afterwards."

"A stim?"

"Yes, she complained of a headache. My medical scans indicated she suffered minor alcohol poisoning."

Quinn sighed. Of course she was troubled. "What else? She was … wounded earlier. Has she recovered?"

"Yes, captain. Although I am sorry to say that the wound to her stomach will result in a rather telling scar. Further, any effort she makes to become pregnant will require careful monitoring of the incision, as the scar tissue may require additional treatment."

He exhaled a hard breath. Reminded himself to breathe again, even. The droid leaned closer to him, monitoring his appearance, "Captain? Are you well? If you require an additional rest period, I can assist you back to your quarters."

"No. I'm fine." He took another breath. Then another. He stared at the far wall, "Did Lord Lusiel indicate I should remove my things from her quarters?"

"No. Lieutenant Pierce carried you to your quarters shortly after you were treated in the medical bay, by Lord Lusiel's command."

He was confused. Finally, he shook his head at the droid, asked, "Where the hell are we, anyway?"

"We're currently docked at the Nar Shaddaa spaceport, captain."

"And where is everyone?"

"Lord Lusiel is resting in your quarters. Mistress Vette and Lord Jaesa have ventured off the ship in search of what Mistress Vette called 'adventure' at one of the local cantinas. Lieutenant Pierce followed after them, saying they required an escort 'or someone would end up dead'. And Broonmark is currently stealthed next to the doorway leading towards the airlock, which he says is a necessary duty since everyone is either away from the ship or resting."

Quinn eyed the area where Toovee said the Talz was hiding. He grunted, "Hello, Broonmark."

Broonmark warbled back at him, still invisible. "Hello, Sith Mate. Good you no die."

He merely shrugged. He disagreed, for one thing. But he was also somewhat surprised he was still alive, too. Quinn proceeded into the mess, with Toovee following along behind him, his garish coat glaring at him in his peripheral vision. He rubbed his head briefly.

"Captain, is your head paining you? I was instructed to monitor you carefully for any lingering headaches."

He glanced at the droid, "Who ordered you to do that?"

"Lord Lusiel. Her instructions were very clear. I am to ensure you do not suffer any further distress and to inform her if you require even 'one single bit of medical attention' per physical pain of any sort. She was quite emphatic. Are you in pain?" The droid actually leaned over as if to peer into Quinn's eye. He waved the droid back.

"Don't touch me, Toovee. I'm fine." Quinn poured himself a cup of stimcaf just before he settled into a chair next to the table. Toovee rumbled nearby, quickly preparing a plate of almond-kwevvu crisp-munchies that he knew the captain usually enjoyed, only because they weren't as sugared as most baked goods were, only fruit-filled and fried. Quinn eyed the things somewhat morosely, however.

"You should eat, captain. I have been eyeing the dietary habits of the crew over the past year and while I believe some of our members are getting a little thick _you_ are not one of them."

Quinn shot the droid a hard look. "I believe your programming has been tweaked again."

"I don't know what you could mean, captain. I do believe you are the last person who has made changes to my programming."

Quinn grunted as he consumed the pastries, "That could've been added to your programming, as well. I'll examine you later, however. For now, I wanted to examine the bridge for any reports that might need attention." He indicated Toovee should return to his regular position in the lounge as he ducked into the bridge. For a moment Quinn just stood there, looking out the viewport towards the open bay where the ship was currently docked.

He only shook his head, though. Hiding from it wasn't going to change anything. He settled himself into the command chair and hunkered down over the console. He pulled up the medical charts over the treatments Lusiel received while he was unconscious. The laceration, he read, had required a total of five kolto treatments. Lusiel's blood loss had been qualified as "serious" only because, according to the droid's notes, " _Lord Lusiel refused treatment until Captain Quinn was deemed stable._ " He leaned his head back against the chair, his eyes clenched shut. Other than that, she suffered several bruises, two of which were deemed "moderate". " _Lord Lusiel took a blow to the right forearm that bruised the radius bone; no fracture apparent; healing treatments to commence._ " She must have done that when she was pounding that last droid, he thought dully.

His wife, he thought, was no typical Sith. He should've remembered that. Why hadn't he, in fact? Why hadn't he remembered that when Baras was insisting he'd break her, hurt her? What possible reason was there for him to have forgotten her true strength so completely, that he'd failed her so totally? He leaned over trying to think, wondering what it was that had made him forget something so simple. Didn't he tell him so? Yes! He said Lusiel could beat him, she could win. But then … he'd forgotten it. He just became completely convinced that Lusiel couldn't win against Baras. _Why_?

Quinn sighed. He gazed out the viewport, trying to think. He had screwed up so badly. Did the crew know? If not, what had Lusiel told them? Would he be able to remain in her service? She'd slept next to him. Why? What if she divorced him? Divorce in the Empire was hard as hell to obtain but not impossible. Easier to just kill him. But she hadn't. She'd gotten him back to the ship and, apparently, fought like mad to ensure he was made well again. He was confused. His head spun, wildly. He felt exposed and raw, as if every one of his mental doors was yawning widely open.

_"Malavai!"_

Quinn jerked, looked around the bridge trying to find Lusiel, wondering when she'd even approached the room because he hadn't heard her steps. But he was still alone.

_"Malavai, where are you? Please!"_

He jumped up. She was calling him. She sounded so frantic, so scared. Was she dreaming again? A nightmare? He rushed into the lounge, almost running into Toovee. "I'm sorry, captain. Is everything okay? Are you in pain? I must treat you if you're experiencing any pain."

"No, Toovee! Dammit, can't you hear her?"

The droid whined. "No, captain. I can't hear anything except for you. Is there a problem?"

Quinn only stared at the droid for a moment, confused. Then he rushed towards the door to the quarters he shared with Lusiel. He threw the doors open, staring into the room as the bed was suddenly illuminated.

Lusiel was standing next to the bed, wrapped in a sheet she'd apparently yanked free from the cushions. She was shaking as she looked around for him, seemed prepared to rush out of the room to find him, even. He stepped inside the room and the door swished closed behind him. She was agitated as she looked at him, gasping roughly.

He didn't even hesitate, just held his arms open and watched in amazement as she tumbled a few steps to wrap herself around him. The sheet slithered to the floor as he pulled her into his arms and held her, listened to her breathing hard with her head pressed to his chest. He rubbed his jaw against the top of her head, "You called me. I think. Not very sure. I heard you anyway." He felt her nodding.

"I woke up and you weren't here. You slept for two whole days. I wasn't sure you were all right."

He frowned, "You were scared I wasn't well?" She nodded again. But Quinn was still confused, "But why? Lusiel, I don't understand any of this. I hurt you! I tried…" He swallowed, looking towards the far wall.

"Stop it. It wasn't you. Damn Baras, I'll make him pay.” She snuffled against his collarbone, “But not now. Not here. Please. Just … Malavai, just hold me. Please? I need you." She looked up at him, pulled his head around so he'd look at her. "Please?"

Quinn groaned, lifted her up to carry her back to the bed. He laid her down, looked at her lying there against the bed, her pale skin gleaming. He whispered, "I'll make it up to you, Lusiel. I promise I'll make it better. Whatever it takes … Forever." She shook her head, tried to say something. But he shushed her, standing up straight to begin tearing his clothes off. She went quiet as she watched him.

He leaned over her once he was naked, swinging his legs onto the bed so that he could crawl up and lean over her. He pulled her legs up and apart, bracing them against his thighs. He sighed as he looked down at her, whispered, "Ah, Lusiel. Gods." She watched as he ran his fingers gently across the angry, reddened mark that ran the entire length of her stomach. It would scar, he knew. She crooned, reaching up to cup his face in her hands and forcing him to look at her.

"Don't, Malavai. Please." She raised herself up, so that she could kiss him desperately, frantically thrusting her tongue into his mouth and feeling him meet her with his own. He wrapped her into his arms, twisting his head so that he could feast on her mouth, her lips. He groaned as he kissed her, as she ran her fingers through his hair at the back of his head, scratched at the back of his neck. Her hips began twitching, moving back and forth, so that he could feel her buttocks rubbing rhythmically back and forth on his thighs.

But he still kissed her, held her. He lowered her back to the bed, his lips still pressed to hers. He rubbed his chest against hers in circles, felt her breasts pressing into him, crushed up against him, and he just rubbed himself on her. She moaned into his mouth, and he gently ran his tongue along her lower lip, sucked it into his mouth. He released her mouth when she sighed, leaned back to smile at her. Then he kissed her chin, her neck, moved down across her chest.

He leaned back to stare at her breasts, slowly cupped them, rubbed her nipples between his fingers. She gasped, and he looked up into her eyes. He talked to her, told her how beautiful she was, how much he loved touching her, how pretty her breasts were. She arched her back, pressed herself into his hands, and she moaned. He leaned over to suck one nipple into his mouth, held it there as he tweaked it again and again with his tongue, lashed it into hard peakness, and fondled its twin with his fingers.

She sobbed into his mind, _"Don't stop, please!"_

He assured her aloud, barely aware as he promised her, "Never."

Then he lavished her other nipple with his mouth, too. He laved it with his tongue and suckled against her. She moaned, twisting her torso against him, arching to press herself closer to him. He buried his face between her breasts, kissed her gently there. Then he ran his tongue further down, blew a puff of air against her belly button, kissed her.

Then he stopped, laid his head softly against her belly, sighing a deep breath as he only held her. She caressed his head, ran her fingers gently across his ear, over his brow and down across his cheek. She felt his breath across her stomach, felt it against the still healing scar, there. She smiled, _"Love you."_ He squeezed her, sighing. Then he pressed a kiss just above her mound, moving down still more.

Quinn spread her legs, smoothed his hands across her inner thighs, encouraging her wider. He used his thumbs to gently press her lips apart, expose her softest flesh, watched it dew in anticipation. "Beautiful," he whispered to her. He kissed her first. Then he eased his tongue out, touched her clit, tweaked at it. Back and forth. He felt Lusiel's thighs tighten against his shoulders, held her open, as he settled down to begin suckling on that button of sensation. She began crying out-loud, the sweetest moans, and then words that whispered through his head, so intense that he groaned into her sex, _"Yes … like that … so good … it feels so damn good … don't stop, don't … more … Yes!"_

He felt her quivering, her thighs shaking as Lusiel shattered into orgasm. He moaned as she trembled and shuddered against him, gently holding her clit between his lips. He slowly released her from his mouth as she softened, gentled, easing. He looked up at her, saw her eyes were closed, saw her panting. He pressed a kiss to the inside of her thigh.

He raised himself up onto his knees, grasped his hard erection. He lifted her, tilted her hips into position, rubbed himself against her in teasing circles. She was so wet, so perfect, so heated and warm. He groaned, as he watched himself moving against her sweet entrance. _"Malavai."_ He looked up towards her face, saw her watching him. He stayed like that, watching her eyes as he began sliding inside, watched her gaze darken, deepen. They both moaned as he reached the very center of her, as his groin met fully against her own.

She reached up, ran the palms of her hands down across his chest, tweaked his nipples with her fingers. He began thrusting into her, watching her the entire time, looking at her as she leaned up to continue touching him. She laid her hands on his shoulders, ran them down his arms, grasped his forearms where they were braced on either side of her. He thrust harder, until his hips were pounding against the backs of her thighs. The sound of skin smacking against skin filled the room, interspersed with moans from each of them.

And words. Words that spilled, one from the other, skittling across their minds as they heatedly shared their feelings and sensations.

_"Don't stop. It feels good."_

_"Lusiel."_

_"So deep in me."_

_"Wet. Love."_

He dropped his head, watching himself moving in and out of her. He could feel her, the way she was tightening, knew she was close. Faster. He moved even harder into her, the way she liked, the way he knew would make her come. She clutched him, dug her nails into his arms so hard he knew he'd end up bleeding, didn't care. Because she was right there. And then he felt her shaking and flying apart, watched her eyes widen and go liquid chocolate. Her inner muscles gripped him, squeezed, and he met her orgasm with his own, felt it blazing up his spine so that he threw back his head and yelled out her name as he came harder than he'd ever come before. He buried himself as deep inside of her as he could, spurting wildly. He shook against her, quavered, as she ran her hands up and down his sweat-sheened chest.

And he reached down to grasp her backside, held her pressed to him as he rolled over onto his back, pulling her with him so that she was draped over his front. She lay on top of him, rested her head against his chest. She listened to his heart beating against her ear, sighed.

He drifted, sleepy again. How could he be so tired when he had already slept for two days, he wondered. But he lay there, anyway. He softened inside of her but didn't fall free, either. So he stayed. He only wrapped his arms around her, held her and sighed.

_"It will be okay, Malavai. I'll kill him. Don't worry."_

He frowned softly, as he realized he was hearing words even though her mouth didn’t move.


	102. You Slug, Baras

Lusiel scowled as the image of Darth Baras filled the holoterminal in front of her. That much of the man on her ship made her want to hit something. Preferably him. She’d settle for the holoterminal, though.

Next to her, Quinn rubbed his forehead and she breathed slowly to regain her equilibrium. She was certain that suddenly bombarding her husband's mind with a flood of invectives against Baras would prove at least uncomfortable for him.

Still. She looked up at Baras, thinking, " _You slug. I'm going to fucking crush you_."

"Consider yourself fortunate I'm reaching out to you this way, my old apprentice," Baras intoned. Lusiel nearly laughed. Instead, she settled back into her old game. She rubbed the backside of her fingers against the shoulder of her tunic, eyed her shining nails critically.

"I'm sorry. Should I know you?" She tapped her chin with a small finger, dramatically thoughtful. Vette choked back a laugh from where she lounged against a far wall and tossed her a sideways glance. _Lost the game before it really started, Vette_.

"Your wit has not improved." Oh, Baras, allow me to disagree, she thought as she rolled her eyes. If she were any less witty, they would have to sing praises to her wit across the whole of the holonet! Baras looked heavenward, as if begging for patience, "It must be ignorance driving your actions. As wronged by me as you may feel, surely you are not intentionally defying the Emperor. You are being deceived!"

Good play, Baras. She shook her head though, smiling slightly. She tapped her fingers against the terminal in front of her, "How entertaining. The deceiver ranting of deceptions. By all means, continue. I needed the droll humor this morning."

"I don't blame you for doubting me and I will not apologize for my actions."

"Well, that's a relief. Here I thought we were going to drag this farce out."

"Be careful, girl! I am the Voice of the Emperor! And there is a reason for all that we do. In the end, what you think doesn't matter. But your handlers have you in over your head, sticking your wet nose in Darth business."

Lusiel bit her lip, thinking how tender Baras' nerves had grown. It had normally required much more prodding before he became bothered. Of course, she'd thus far managed to kill his sister, stole his fleet, burned his apprentice to a crisp, and freed the Emperor he was trying to supplant. His sensitivity was probably to be expected, she chuckled to herself.

She winked up at him, "Soon I'll stick my lightsaber into a Darth, too."

"You anger has blinded you. Walk away now and perhaps our previous animosities can be set aside." He peered around her, taking in her people gathered there, "Think, child. There are those depending on you to make the correct decision, here. Family, even."

Lusiel’s expression hardened. "My family is precisely why I will annihilate you, Baras. You will never touch one of them again. Trust me."

"You're making a mistake."

She barked a laugh as soon as the man's image faded from the screen.

"You won the game, my lord," Vette whooped next to her. Lusiel grinned back at her, while everyone else sighed and shook their heads. Pierce was still staring at the holoterminal, stunned enough to be angry, "What fucking balls. He's gonna forgive you, huh?"

Lusiel waved a hand, "He's pitifully desperate. That, or he's lost his mind. At the least, he provided us all a moment of amusement." She was still pleased she won the game to keep from laughing in Baras's face.

Pierce shrugged. He laced his fingers together, slowly and methodically cracked the knuckles in dire promise, "Well, after what he did to you and the captain, I'm looking forward to booting that son of a bitch in the ass. Pardon, my lord." He inclined his head towards Lusiel, who only shrugged.

Jaesa suddenly growled. "You're only saying what we're all thinking, Pierce. Master, we want Baras to pay for what he's done. He left scars on the both of you, brutalized Quinn. He can't be _allowed_ to live, not after that."

"Believe me. He will not live for much longer, you have my word, Jaesa," Lusiel lifted her chin. "Enough talk for now. Baras' assassins here on Corellia must be stopped." They all nodded towards her, moving away from the terminal. Quinn was still quiet, though, as he gestured for her to join him. Lusiel sighed as she followed him onto the bridge.

"What's bothering you, Quinn?" Lusiel looked at him, her head cocked to the side.

"I'm not sure what they were told, actually," Quinn dropped his gaze to the floor, obviously troubled. Lusiel exhaled.

"I told them the truth."

"They know I tried to kill you."

"They know that Baras tormented you you into trying to kill me, yes."

"I could have said no."

Lusiel scowled at him, "You _did_ say no. Quite emphatically, mind you."

He looked back into her eyes, frowning, "How can you be so certain?"

"Please. I can’t explain such a thing. It’s enough that I know you, Malavai.”

"But I did do it."

Lusiel shrugged, looking out at the stars drifting past them through the viewscreen, "No, you didn't." The memory of him holding up the blaster pistol as he faced her still hurt, the burning pain in his eyes and the torment there. It hurt.

"I shot a blaster at you, Lusiel!"

"You missed."

He was starting to become angry, but Lusiel raised a hand, pointing at him, "No, Quinn! I'm not sure you realize how little control you actually had during that encounter! It's enough you understand that _I_ realized it, even as it happened. Now stop it!"

Quinn huffed, rocking back on his heels. He seemed bewildered all of a sudden. Lusiel actually chuckled as she watched him. " _Ah, Quinn. Not sure what to think, hmm? That's why you love me, husband. I make sure you're never bored_." She laughed outright when he frowned at her, trying to figure out if she'd spoken out loud.

Quinn angled his gaze towards the viewport, looking at the planet of Corellia outside. He changed the subject neatly, his expression harsh and adamant as he pointed at the terminal, "You received another coded transmission, my lord. I've decrypted it for you."

Lusiel hummed as she stepped up alongside him at the communications console. He tapped a series of buttons and they stood together as the message played: " _Received your message just today. What the hell are you talking about, signal emitters and martial law over Corellia? Advise you respond to this message immediately, else I'll come looking for you. I won’t hesitate to hunt down whatever bastard is feeding you that load of nerf-shit. And Force preserve the son of a bitch if you've been hurt, dammit. Where are you, Lou?_ "

Lusiel chuckled towards Quinn. "Well, that would be an awkward first meeting for the two of you, wouldn't it?"

He shrugged, "He's an agent with Imperial Intelligence, obviously. He does seem fond of you, and you keep him well-apprised."

"You're so adorable when you're jealous, Quinn. But yes, I likely should have sent him another message several days ago. Obviously."

"I'm _not_ jealous."

She laughed, "Make sure to tell him that when you meet him. He has a habit of making husbands jealous. To know there's one he's failed to get a rise out of will burst his little bubble."

Quinn frowned. "He makes a habit of seducing married women?"

"Oh, he doesn't limit himself to married women at all."

"And why in the hell would I want to meet him?"

Lusiel chuckled slowly, "Because it's important you get to know my brother. I’m rather surprised you haven’t met him already, actually." She leaned her head down over the terminal. She frowned slightly, “Whatever work is occupying him must be vital.”

Quinn looked at her, staring. Then he slowly smiled, breathed, "Khyriel." He should have known!

"And here I thought you weren't jealous."


	103. Blowing Things Up Before Shopping

Quinn was focused and determined. Lusiel had told Darth Charnus she "trusted no one more than she did her captain" and he would repay her for that gift, would show that her trust in him was well placed.

He knelt down in front of Czerka’s hull-cracker, working fast to arm the explosives contained within the weapon. Pierce loomed over his back, yelling over his head at the other soldiers, "Don't let the droids get too close! Keep them back!" Blaster fire resounded, filling the air with a maddening cacophony, of clinking and whirring droids all popping and exploding in wild bursts.

Pierce leaned over to yell into Quinn’s ear, "Hurry up, captain."

"Shut up, lieutenant,” Quinn didn’t hesitate to yell back at him, never looking away from the control box he was working on. “I need to do this right or we'll blow up right here and now." Quinn yanked several wires loose from the device. He examined the connections with precise, methodical care, pulled the black connector free to strip it rapidly, and then he attached it to the spark at the end of the red line.

He heard Pierce grunt a pained sound and shot him a quick glance. The soldier was beating roughly against a spot on his side now smoking where a blaster bolt must have zipped and burned him. But Quinn didn’t believe he was seriously injured. Not when Pierce looked hard at him and shouted, “Damn it, Quinn! Hurry up!”

Quinn nodded, pushing his head nearly into the interior of the hull-cracker so that he could better see the last wired connectors. He fastened the lines exactly into place, making sure all the filaments were sparking correctly. Then he jumped back to his feet, yelling towards Pierce, "Now, lieutenant. Get everyone back!"

The Imperials sprinted down the ramp, out of the hull-cracker's explosive range. Pierce gripped Quinn's arm, practically throwing him behind one of the large concrete barriers near the gate. Quinn grunted as the lieutenant suddenly dropped nearly on top of him, tried elbowing him off from his back. But Pierce growled and ducked over Quinn as a large piece of burning metal debris suddenly flew over their heads, almost taking his head and just glancing across his armored shoulder. Quinn pushed him off as the smoke began to slowly dissipate. Then he looked over the barrier to examine the blasted entrance into the doors of Corellian Engineering’s headquarters.

"We've succeeded, lieutenant." Quinn looked at Pierce, examining his shoulder critically, "Were you injured?"

"Nothing worth worrying over. Think there's a dent in my armor, is all." Pierce looked at the damage, sighing, "My favorite set, too."

"It’s pretty enough, Pierce, I'll grant you that," Sergeant Arlos chuckled over at him.

"Fuck you, Arlos."

"Speaking of fucking, when you bringing your little girl back to play with us again?"

"You want me to bust your face?"

The soldiers laughed quietly as they followed behind Quinn towards the doors. He glanced back at them. "Quiet. There are surely defenses inside. Stay focused on the mission."

He heard Sergeant Cole grumble an aside towards Pierce. "He hasn't changed much since Belsavis. Why haven't you pulled the stick out of his ass?"

Pierce grunted, "Shut your trap, Cole."

"I see he's rubbed off on you, Pierce."

Quinn heard a distinct thud of a fist striking against flesh, then Cole coughed harshly in pain. He sighed.

_____________________________________

"I don't get it. Wasn't the merlot good enough?" Pierce snarled at Quinn. He swiped a hand across his sweat-stained brow. He glared at the black-haired human leaning silently against the door of the shop. Blasted fellow had been scanning the two Imperial officers with an amused expression the entire while Quinn spent bent over the shopkeep’s list. A dark-skinned woman was biting her lip as she stood next to him, politely looking anywhere but over at Pierce and Quinn.

Quinn replied, "Lieutenant, I did tell you to return to the ship. I can easily restock these stores without you."

Pierce snorted instead of ducking back out of the shop. Because he certainly wasn’t going to mention how afraid he was of losing more teeth should something happen to Quinn while he was outside. He certainly didn’t trust the black-haired nabob lounging behind them, anyway. Pierce only frowned curiously, "How is it you manage to look all properly stiff and pressed, despite being covered head to toe in dust and blood, while I just look like something spit out by a rankor?"

"Genetics, lieutenant. Blame your parents."

"I really do hate you sometimes, Quinn."

"The feeling is completely mutual."

This time the stranger still leaning near the door laughed aloud, earning another glare from Pierce. Not that it stopped him laughing. Pierce eyed the man's rifle, noticed its well-worn grip. He snarled at him, "You’re not an Imperial, are you?"

The man shook his head. His accent was clearly Corellian when he answered, "Nah, I’m local. Not like either one of you, obviously enough."

Pierce shrugged, effectively shifting the black chestpiece adorned with Sith markings on his shoulders. "Amazing observation skills you've got there."

"What can I say? I'm just good at what I do," he grinned when Pierce glared at him again. Quinn ignored them both and Pierce turned back around to eye the product list along with him. Pierce tapped the screen, “Since we won’t move until we find the right sort, what kind exactly does she prefer?” Quinn didn’t ask him how Pierce guessed who he was shopping for, if only because they already visited the vendor selling potent beverages.

"Denta Bean."

"Well, says he's got it. So what's the problem?"

"He wants to know if she's pregnant. I don't understand why."

Pierce stared at Quinn for a long moment. "Well. Is she?"

Quinn glared at him, "No."

Pierce held his hands up defensively, "Hey, it was a fair question. You two were making plenty of noise the other night."

"Shut. Up."

Pierce grunted. "Yep. Shutting up. Damned if I’ll try helping anymore."

The Corellian was shaking his head at them, "Women crave ice cream when they're pregnant." Both Imperals stared at him. "Hey, I don't mind if you buy all of the denta bean. I only wanted some of the beebleberry." He gestured towards his female companion, "It's her favorite."

Pierce grinned at the man, "So your woman is pregnant, then?" The Corellian whitened, his lips suddenly pursing. But his pretty woman companion laughed and shook her head towards Pierce.

Quinn sighed dramatically. He looked at the vendor, "I'll take all of the denta bean ice cream you have on hand. See that it's delivered to the correct docking bay."

_____________________________________

Pierce plopped down into a chair on the other side of the table across from where Quinn was sitting. He eyed the bottle of Corellian whiskey the captain was downing very steadily, “I was wondering about the whiskey when we picked out those fine wines earlier. Didn’t realize you were going to drink it all, though.” Quinn looked back at him with a glazed expression in his eyes. Pierce leaned forward, "So have you seen Vette yet?"

Quinn nodded very deliberately, like he was concentrating hard just to get his head to make the proper motion. "Indeed. She was right here just a few moments ago, I think. What time is it, again?"

Pierce chuckled, "So she won her bet, huh? You do realize she’s probably uploading the recording onto every terminal of the ship, right?"

The captain shrugged as he took another long sip from the glass he was drinking from, "Actually, I don't believe I was entertaining enough to suit her."

"Nah, you wouldn't be. You'd have to wear a purple polka dot suit first. Or any color apron. Or at least _smile_. She's a funny little twi'lek like that."

"I am not funny."

"You're certainly not funny right now, that's for sure. What the hell's the matter with you?"

Quinn looked at Pierce, glaring as much as he could, considering the room was spinning around him. "She was bleeding. Because I cut her."

"Yea, figured that's why we had to go fucking shopping today. And without even showering first, to boot. Gods, what a day." Pierce leaned back. He plunked a glass in front of himself before yanking the bottle out of Quinn’s hand. Then he gulped back a shot of whiskey and refilled both glasses with more of the amber-colored liquid. The two men sat there together, slowly consuming the entire bottle of whiskey.

Pierce looked over at Quinn, shaking his head. "You know it amazed me. She stood there, shaking, blood dripping all down her legs. And all she was worried about was you." Quinn flinched. But Pierce held his hand up. "No. Listen to me. Sith are weird creatures, captain. I can't really wrap my head round them, and trust me I've tried. Jaesa confuses the shit out of me!"

He took another drink.

"But the way I see it, is they have ways of doing things and thinking about things that don't necessarily make a whole helluva lot of sense. Those two Sith didn't hesitate that day, not while you were laying there on that table. Neither of them were even angry at you. Now, I don't know why, cause when she told me what happened I was certainly pissed at you."

He shook his head at Quinn.

"But not them. Not even for a moment. They just shrugged and said Baras'd done it and I should be angry at _him_ , instead. I finally figured that they had some Sith way of knowing these things and I just shut the hell up. And maybe that's what you should be doing. You know, just accept that Baras did something to you."

Quinn blinked at him, "Is that why you haven't tried to kill me, lieutenant?"

Pierce shook his head. "Nope. That had more to do with Lord Lusiel knocking out two of my teeth and swearing she'd rip my arms off if I tried."

Quinn stared at him, "You're an ass, lieutenant."

"You would know."


	104. He Died at Home

Borren Li was already in a bitter mood as he climbed down out of the shuttle. The irony certainly wasn't lost on him, anyway. Even if he'd accepted a contract to kill a blasted member of the Empire's Dark Council, the fact remained he was riding an Imperial shuttle into Imperial-held areas of his home planet as they fought to conquer Corellia. He scowled as he looked up to take in the plumes of thick, black smoke billowing over the skyline above Corenet City. Damn the Imps, every last one of them.

Just then, one of his fellow passengers stumbled against Borren, tripping over the lip of the ramp leading down out of the shuttle. He eyed the man coldly, saw him blanch when he noticed Borren's well-muscled frame encased in padded armor and the two blasters snuggly nestled against his thighs. He began stammering at Borren with a typically fussy Imperial manner then, his accent identifying him as some sorry bureaucratic servant, probably from Dromund Kaas itself. "Sorry, swear it. Damn ramp caught my foot. Didn't even see you there. I'll … uh … I'll get out of your way right now, promise."

Borren watched as he took off in a near sprint for the nearby door leading to the elevator. And that's when he caught sight of the two women standing there, watching him. They moved smoothly out of the terrified administrator's path, so that he could tumble by them onto the elevator. Borren's last sight of the man showed him taking a deep breath of tremendous relief as he huddled against the far wall of the conveyance just before the door slid shut.

Borren turned his attention to his greeting party, then. Obviously Sith, he thought. The leader was smaller than her companion but there was no doubt whatsoever she was the one in charge. She exuded strength and capability. He slid his gaze down her small, armored body, his eyes lighting quickly on the curves of her breasts under the hard metal breastplate. Her robes were gray and black, with red underlinings and trim. Her face wasn't covered, either, not like so many Sith obscured their features under ghastly helmets and masks. No, not this Sith. She proudly displayed her face, with her creamy pale skin and soft pink lips.

Not that he doubted her skill, even if she looked as purely sweet as a piece of candy. Especially with those eyes staring at him, reminding him of nothing so much as chocolate. No, this was a Sith who's career he'd followed carefully, and he knew very well she was a deadly and lethal member of her race.

He briefly eyed her companion. Her name flitted across his memory. Jaesa Willsaam was the former apprentice to the Jedi Nomen Karr, destroyed by the same small Sith woman Jaesa now served so loyally. He had heard Jaesa was every bit as dangerous as her master, to boot.

She was certainly pretty enough. Although the woman she served was far more alluring. It’s why he smiled seductively towards the women as he approached them so slowly, "Well, well. Looks like we're all alone up here, me and my welcoming party. It isn't every day a man's fortunate enough to dally with two beautiful women off in some secret corner of a battle zone."

The woman's chocolate brown eyes glinted with amusement. But she was quick, he'd give her that. "Not sure how fortunate it is when it becomes the man's secret graveyard."

"Oh you are funny. I like that. It's not often we find funny in my line of work. And I never would've thought it of you. All the stories only describe you as _dangerous_." Borren actually smiled at her.

"You're an admirer, then?"

"Of course. I've followed your exploits for some time now. You're the apprentice Darth Baras thought he had killed. Marvelous." Borren leaned back against a nearby cargo barrel, "Hell, I've been following stories of you ever since you killed Lord Gratham's son back on Dromund Kaas. Turned down a job offer for that piece of work. You may want to consider the fact that man still hates you with a passion, you know."

He shook his head at her.

"I mean, I've heard you got married. Gratham's latest bounties are for the heart of your firstborn." Borren chuckled when Lusiel's eyes sharpened into real anger. "You Sith are so damn predictable in your rages, huh? Although it surprises me how protective you all are of your offspring. You just seem so uncaring of the lives around you."

"You're not amusing me any longer, assassin."

"Yea, I can see that." He laughed, "Makes me wonder how unamused you'd be if I promised to hunt down the rest of your family after I destroy you. How protective of your own are you, if you go flying off the handle over threats to some creature not even born yet, even? As I said, predictable. Poor Sith. I won't laugh too much when your temper tantrum makes you clumsy."

Lusiel shook her head. "You don't understand Sith battle, I see. Anger makes us more powerful. More deadly. More dangerous." She activated the crimson length of her lightsaber, "I would've given you a quick, easy death. Now I'll saw off your damn head. And enjoy it."

Borren heard a chopping bark of laughter from Jaesa Willsaam. But his gaze was full of Lusiel, as the small woman flew through the air, her robe billowing behind her and her lightsaber singing a loud crescendo as she came at him. She was shouting a loud cry of war and battle to the sky. Gorgeous, he thought, even as she landed in front of him and her little fist connected with deadly force against his jaw. And then he finally realized that her size and her gender were no real match for her reputation at all. He’d miscalculated so badly, in fact.

_At least I was able to die at home_ , he thought to himself when the Sith jerked his head back and he could see more smoke flying overhead.


	105. Into Darth Vowrawn's Space

Lusiel rolled her eyes. "And here I'd thought Vowrawn particularly clever, to work right under the noses of Republic forces, where they'd never think to look for him. Then I run in here to find you." She pointed at the officer in charge, scowling, "Your accent is poking through, fool."

Captain Garret stumbled back, stammering something equally foolish about how she shouldn't mind such obvious markers of his true loyalties. Lusiel sighed loudly. She crossed her arms across her chest, "You're going to get Darth Vowrawn killed, damn you."

Nervous or not, he did stand his ground. Lusiel might have admired Garret's fortitude in the face of the threat she posed. Except his complete ineptitude disgusted her too much. Lusiel decided he must have been compelled to stand there in her way, because the man was a complete waste as a soldier. Infuriated the Sith she was seeking to protect had been so flimsily guarded, Lusiel finally flung the force at the babbling officer, tossing him across the room just as he began shouting for support.

Jaesa whooped when the flying soldier neatly collided with another soldier running into the room with his rifle held up in threat. She pulled her gleaming golden lightsaber free, nodding towards Lusiel, "I could almost believe you did that on purpose, my lord. Like a bowling match. Would have been far better if you'd knocked down more of them."

Lusiel shrugged. "It's a neat score, regardless."

"Oh, I don't know. Maybe I could see if I was any better at aiming, than you."

"By all means."

The two women began tossing the soldiers backwards and into each other, all around the room, playfully battering the armored figures against the walls, floor and pillars that made up the space. Their game was interspersed with bantering calls towards each other, hoots for success and a few boos when one soldier or another missed a particular target. But the only sound at the end were the pitiful groans from whichever men were still conscious as they all lay in sorry lumps around the room.

Captain Garret rolled over, his left eye nearly swollen shut. But he was still able to see the two Sith making their way towards him. He choked, horrified as he skittered backwards away from them. He couldn't reach his blaster, not from where it was lying, there on the other side of one of his downed men. But he did try hitting the black-haired Sith woman when she leaned over him.

She snorted at him, "Your arm is broken in two places, idiot. Want your neck broken as well? Or will you just hand me the passkey to the door?"

Captain Garret looked at the Sith dazedly. Then he reached down to finger open the pouch on his belt that held the appropriate key. He shook as he handed the thing to her. Then he lay back as she stood and started walking away. The last thing he saw was the back of her boots as she stepped through the door and proceeded towards Darth Vowrawn's quarters.

_____________________________________

Lord Qet stalked through the corridor, along with two of his master's Sith followers. His defeat loomed over him, he sensed it. It was like a sour note singing at him through the Force, assuring him he could not hope to succeed. He'd only once before heard that bitter sound, in the ringing of slaves' voices rising in rebellion against the dark jungles of Dromund Kaas as the monumental edifice that should have been his master's gift to the ages, his likeness to shine through the eons, towered unfinished overhead.

And now he swallowed against the same acrimonious pill, the worst understanding -- that he could not hope to succeed. That yet again he would _fail_. It was certain that he would die in the coming moments. Still, he refused to bow under that pressure. He would face his death wholly, with the honor befitting his master, Darth Vowrawn. His defeat would earn Vowrawn precious moments enough he might escape.

That's when he saw her for the first time, as he came around the corner in front of the lift at the very furthest end of the penthouse chambers. He gaped at the sight of her, this tiny slip of a female, with her dark hair gathered behind her head and her eyes glimmering darkly in her pale face. _This_ was the feared enforcer that Baras had inflicted on his master? _This_ was the mighty Sith who had destroyed so many Jedi –Masters, even! – as well as generals and admirals, and their soldiers, and hutts, pirates, and criminals? This small minx of a woman was _that_ Sith?

He nearly scoffed. Haresh had to be wrong. This woman wasn't such an awful threat. Surely he would survive this confrontation, could destroy this one single, tiny woman. He actually pointed a large meaty finger in her face, demanding that she come not a step further. He watched her, saw her slight gesture towards the Sith girl who followed her. The pair of them both came to a halt, standing there in front of him.

He threw back his shoulders, so as to better loom over them. He was a large, looming figure of a man, and he used his superior size accordingly. Qet barked at the women, "You'll come no closer, scum."

"This one doesn't seem any smarter than the last fellow, master. How many times did you need to say 'I hate Baras' anyway?" The taller woman leaned forward to address her master.

Lusiel shrugged, "But it may be plausible a belief, that I only claim opposition to Baras in order to trick Darth Vowran."

"Bah! You're far too blunt for that sort of approach."

"Ah, don’t know me so well, Jaesa. Their caution is understandable." She grinned at Qet suddenly, "Even commendable. Better than the soldiers downstairs, at least."

The one called Jaesa muttered, "It's still a pain."

"I thought you enjoyed a good fight."

"There is that, yes. Maybe this one will put up a better fight at least."

Lord Qet stepped forward, indignant in the face of their mocking tone. They came here to laugh? He threatened, "I won’t let you harm my master, don’t care how you managed to get here! There are three of us to face you now, don’t be fools!"

Lusiel looked at Qet and his Sith followers, smirking, "Really? I've seen your unfinished statue on Dromund Kaas. I'm no more impressed by you in person now." Qet finally lost his temper, snarling at her. It really was rather impressive to watch him, Lusiel thought. Qet was over-large, with broad, thick shoulders. His chest barreled outward, too. She wondered if he made it a point to eat raw meat, or some other strange dietary option that puffed out a male’s form into such bulging mounds of muscle. It certainly the red mottled expression on his face remarkably vivid, almost like an imminent volcanic explosion. She raised her eyebrows patiently as she waited.

"Stop! Lord Qet, stand down!"

They all froze in place, although Lusiel leaned sideways to look behind Qet at the newcomer. Darth Vowrawn was not as broad or large as his apprentice. But his dark purple skin with the fringe coming off his face was notably Pureblood, making him an arresting and prominent Sith. He strode forward, his shoulders held back and straight, his chin thrust up and proud. Qet glanced at him respectfully as Vowrawn stepped up to stand alongside him, "My Lord, please. You should retreat, while we defeat this assassin."

Vowrawn sneered back at him. "There could be ten of you and you would fail. You've completely misjudged this Sith's power. She is tremendous." Qet eyed Lusiel once again, frowning doubtfully. Vowrawn snorted at him, "Only leave us."

Lusiel waved her hand dismissively at the apprentice, "Listen to your master, Qet."

Vowrawn exhaled with what amounted to relief, "Thank you for that much, at least. My people will not cause you any problems, here. There is no need to destroy them." Lusiel leaned back, gazing at the Sith who stayed close, refused to leave Vowrawn there alone. They really _were_ loyal, she realized. She recognized the motions, the subtle glances at her that promised a hard fight if she pressed them and the slow leaning towards a master they all respected. Vowrawn lifted his dark head, as if preparing, “Very well then. You might as well convey my congratulations to your master for his superior gameplay. I'm ready then. Only … Could you avoid carrying my head to him? So undignified, to be reduced down to a mere trophy on Baras’ wall."

Qet stepped back behind Vowrawn. He growled in real distress, his eyes stark and pained. But he would not disobey his master’s rule now. Especially now. He would wait until she’d struck Vowrawn down, and then he would avenge him rather. Except Lusiel sighed and looked up at the ceiling, as if wearied beyond measure..

“I’ve repeated myself no less than seven times as I made my way up to these chambers, Darth Vowrawn. I actually counted! I am beginning to think your people lack the simplest ability to comprehend the spoken word." She squared her shoulders, declaring like rote, “I've been sent by the Emperor's Hand to ensure your safety, my lord. So stop calling Baras my master. I intend to gut him before I’m done."

Qet stopped, staring at Lusiel. The anger coming from her, the palpable hatred that emanated from her small, beautiful frame – it was purely Sith, wholly real, and utterly vast. For the first time, Qet sensed how dangerous the woman was, and he shuddered. She would have swatted him down like a bug, without even a speck of sweat to dot her eyebrow when she was finished. He idly wondered what Baras had done to her, what had happened that she hated him so strongly.

Vowrawn’s eyes flew wide open with surprised delight, “You’re speaking the truth! You really do want Baras destroyed! But this would mean … Hah! Then the Emperor himself is acting! How wonderful!"

Qet thought he heard a mumble coming from Lusiel's apprentice, like, "Another Sith who plays games - great." He shot the girl a glance, noticed her bright yellow eyes staring back at him from under her red hood. And just then he heard a thump from behind them, heard a telltale beeping countdown. He hunkered, throwing his hands up and yelling as he used the Force to create a purple-edged barrier that shielded his master from the attack.

The explosion ripped through the place, lifting up the heavy table next to them before dropping it with a heady thud against the pearly edge of Qet’s barrier. Qet glanced behind him, saw that Vowrawn was slowly standing back up and holding his side. Then there was a blast from a pistol, and Qet spun back to face the door where an ugly-faced Weequay was lurking. The man must have skirted through one of the far-flung windows of the house to catch them so off-guard. Qet cursed, thinking how much worse it was to die this way. Not even a Sith, he thought miserably.

But then Lusiel was there, her small frame landing smoothly in front of him. The crimson slash of her lightsaber lit the space as she blocked the bolt flying at Qet, and then she waved towards the assassin, "Good! I was looking for you!"

The Weequay shrugged his thick shoulders and tossed his head tendrils back from in front of his eyes, glaring at Lusiel, "Get out of the way, girlie. I have a job to do."

"Funny. So do I. I wonder which one of us will succeed.” But then Lusiel smirked evilly, “That’s a lie, mind you. I haven’t been wondering about it at all. And I won’t."

Qet watched Lusiel, even as he gripped his master's arm and yanked him back around the large toppled table, putting it between Vowrawn and the fight. Shielding his master even as Lusiel flew at the Weequay. The sound of her lightsaber as she waved it over her head and brought it down and across the assassin's head was strident, true. Qet saw her brace her feet into the swings of her blade, her hips thrusting forward while her shoulders flared back and up, her strength so amazing and beautiful -- she was phenomenal, extraordinary, and he heard Vowrawn, next to him, remarking, "I'd heard the stories. Truly amazing to watch, though."

"Yes. Amazing." Qet's eyes glinted as he watched her, his groin going taut and hard. Not that Vowrawn blamed him. He himself was tantalized watching Lusiel's battle motions. A Sith like that was truly a marvel, he thought.

Jaesa yelled towards her master just then, "He has a vibroblade!" Jaesa stayed nearby the front of the table, working to protect the Darth as Lusiel would want her to do.

Lusiel was already spinning out of the reach of the assassin's twisting strike. She laughed when he shouted angrily at her. Then she spun her lightsaber in a cool and easy arch of motion, so that his hand, still clutching that pretty vibroblade raised up against her, went flying across the room. The weequay screamed, pulling his severed limb into his chest as he sputtered in cruel pain. Lusiel spun on her feet, her lightsaber flashing in a lethal circle against the assassin's stomach. The sound of his innards falling against the floor pounded sickeningly in the room.

Lusiel stepped neatly out of the way of the obscene mess, ignoring the hissing sound the assassin made as he slowly died. She looked towards Vowrawn instead, making sure the Darth was safe enough. "Are you injured, my lord?" She gestured towards his side.

"No, I'm fine. It was a minor blow, hardly worth mentioning. I’m excited, rather! There are measures we can make that will defeat Baras' power play here on Corellia. It's why I came here," Vowrawn felt another thrill of excitement. At last, he trilled silently to himself! At last he could finally ruin Baras once and for all! Lord Lusiel was the most perfect tool!

Qet shifted next to him. "We must retire to a more defensible location, master." Vowrawn nodded at him thoughtfully.

Lusiel shrugged. "My ship and crew can provide you with adequate security, my lord."

"Oh? Do you have more Sith like this one," Vowrawn gestured towards Jaesa.

"Hardly." Lusiel chuckled, "My apprentice is remarkable, rather. She's destined for truly exceptional work as a powerful assassin in my service. But the rest of my crew is just as impressive, my lord." Jaesa lifted her chin proudly, staying quiet when Qet scoffed at them.

"Who would you think might be that capable?"

Lusiel didn't hesitate. "My captain. His tactical expertise is unmatched. And his loyalty unrivalled. He will be able to protect Darth Vowrawn as I work to secure our efforts against Baras here on Corellia."

Qet was doubtful, "An Imperial?" Jaesa snorted at him softly, “If Lord Lusiel tells him to, Quinn would die at Darth Vowrawn’s feet. Smiling the entire time, no less.”


	106. Taxis and Transports and Aliens, Too

Vette thought that Coronet City would've been far prettier if half the buildings weren't burning. Or lying in great big piles of rubble, even. She watched a freighter ship as it swooped down over the city skyline, narrowly missing the ruined hulk of a particularly tall building as it climbed back into the dark, smoking clouds.

"What a dump," she muttered. Broonmark rumbled an agreement as he stood next to her. "Yea, Broonie. Let's get this knocked out so we can head back to the ship." Broonmark followed along behind Vette as she climbed out of the hovering speeder to hurry towards the taxi transport pad, darting around the Imperial guards gathered around the place.

"What are you doing here, you filthy little twi'lek?" One of the guards scowled at Vette, scanning her leathered armor and holstered blasters critically. Broonmark twittered threateningly at him, though, so the guard tossed the furred alien an equally snotty, imperious look. Vette bit her lip.

"Broonie! Stop it! If you tear off his arms, Lord Lusiel might get upset." She considered the soldier slowly when his scowl deepened, "Well. _Maybe_ , at least."

"Look, we don't have time to deal with some fool aliens who think they can just wander into an Imperial encampment. Now get on out of here before I shoot off one your damned head tails."

Vette shrugged, yawning, "I don't know, Broonmark. Maybe Lord Lusiel will be okay with him losing _one_ arm. He has another, right?"

Broonmark warbled as he stepped closer and lifted up his clawed hands to playfully count each one of his digits. "Count two arms. Soldier only needs one. Broonmark can remove left arm. Then human man can still shoot with right arm."

"See? All good," Vette smiled at the offensive guard. He stumbled backwards from the Talz, looking at the creature’s long daggered claws with wide, terrified eyes. But they were all interrupted suddenly.

"Vette! Stop tormenting the poor sergeant. He doesn’t appreciate your pitiful feelings when he’s surrounded by all this blasted wreckage of a world," Lusiel was rolling her eyes when the Imperial spun around to look at her.

He gulped as he ran his gaze over her Sith armor and robes, the lightsaber tucked up against her hip. Not that she needed it, he thought. A Sith only had to _think_ of you dying, and you keeled right over, he believed adamantly. He bowed his head towards the Sith Lord, quickly. "My lord. I am tasked with providing security at this checkpoint. Are you in need of transport? I can attend to it. Right away, my lord. Right away!"

She waved a hand in his direction, watched him scamper away. Vette chuckled as he went, "Good times, my lord."

Lusiel smiled at the twi'lek, waved at her, "Vette, come and meet Darth Vowrawn."

Vette bowed slowly to the Pureblood Sith who stood next to Lusiel. "My lord, it's an honor. I'm to escort you to Lord Lusiel's ship. Me and Broonmark, here." She thumbed a gesture towards the Talz. Broonmark lifted a large vibrosword and rested it onto his wooly shoulder.

Lord Qet, standing just behind Vowrawn, sneered, "Wait! We're to entrust your safety to a bunch of alien slaves, my lord?"

Lusiel frowned at him. "Vette and Broonmark will be far more effective in guarding Darth Vowrawn than those sorry guards you had in front of your penthouse apartments, Qet. Although they did have some rather enjoyable uses, I'll grant you." Jaesa choked back a quick laugh.

Vowrawn smiled, "I trust the Wrath will succeed, Lord Qet. If she says these people can secure us, then they can." Qet shrugged, still glaring over at the twi'lek. But Vette ignored him. It showed Vowrawn a degree of intelligence in even the lowliest of Lusiel’s followers, and he was impressed. He kept chuckling as he moved towards the speeder just in front of Broonmark’s heavy steps.

Vette waited until the Darth was out of earshot, "The captain sent a recorded message, my lord." Lusiel nodded as she took the data device Vette handed to her and tucked it into a pouch on her belt. Then she gestured for Vette to lean closer, speaking quietly, "Is he well, Vette?"

"Yep. The attack on CEC headquarters was successful. Apparently, Quinn managed to hack all the droids in the place, so that the things started shooting up every one of board members. Pierce said it was 'a bloody fine mess' – his words, my lord."

Lusiel smiled. "I never doubted him."

"Nope. You've been quite proud of Mr. Stick Up His Butt since you first clapped eyes on him back on Balmorra."

Lusiel raised an eyebrow at the twi'lek, "It's been some time since you called him names. What did he do now?"

"Toovee's new pink coat is missing!"

Lusiel bit her lip to keep from laughing aloud.

"It's not funny, don't laugh."

"I will not laugh."

"Hah. You're just playing that stupid game with me."

Lusiel shook her head, still biting her lip. Then she eyed Vette, suddenly serious. "Tell me the truth, Vette." Vette looked sideways at Broonmark, where he stood next to the speeder waiting for her. She waved over at him, even as she answered Lusiel with a suddenly heady tone, "Well, I did win the bet."

Lusiel sighed, looking down at the ground. She had sensed Quinn was still so upset. She didn't understand why, though. _She_ wasn’t angry or upset. At least not at _him_. Why couldn't he understand? Vette sighed, "You know, you forget not all of us have your Sithy senses."

Lusiel rolled her eyes. "I do _not_ forget that, Vette."

"Yes, you do. It's sort of like being able to see when everyone around you is blind. You understand things the rest of us just can’t, and because it seems so simple you assume the rest of us just get it too. Because you’ve always done it! But the rest of us are just stumbling along in the dark, meanwhile."

Lusiel only looked at her.

"My point is, he doesn't understand the way you do, that he couldn't have done any different. Hell, my lord. I don't understand it, either. But I am okay with the fact _you_ do. That's enough for me. But Quinn? He just figures he should’ve been able to … Oh, hell. I don’t know, kept from slicing your tummy, maybe."

Lusiel sighed again, looking off towards one of the fires consuming a nearby office building. Vette studied her profile for a moment, then she clucked her tongue softly, "Just don't worry. I won't publish the recording of him drunkenly declaring how much he loves you and how he really loves your eyes. And breasts. He thinks you have the prettiest breasts in the galaxy. He seriously said that! I'll give you the recording, okay? It'll be my birthday present."

Lusiel rolled her eyes. "Vette."

"Hey. Look. Bottom line is, you did the best you could. Don't forget that." Vette shook her head as Lusiel tried to say something, "I mean it! I know you. You had damn good reasons for whatever you decided to do. Or not do, I don't know. But things could've ended up a lot worse for all of us if you'd done anything else. I know it."

Lusiel shrugged.

"Don't think I haven't figured out Baras would've had to perform whatever nasty sorcery he did to Quinn during that invasion of our ship on Hoth." Vette shrugged when Lusiel looked at her. "Yep. Maybe you should consider what would've happened to all of us if Baras hadn't thought he'd won some kind of damn prize during that mess." She watched Lusiel frown thoughtfully.

Vette turned and called over to Broonmark that it was time to return to the spaceport. Then she looked back at Lusiel. "Hey, you could just drag out this guilt trip Quinn's suffering. He bought you a ton of that denta bean ice cream that you like so much, enough to keep you swimming in the stuff for at least a month. Totally up to you, though, my lord."


	107. Winning Notice

Quinn bent over the console on the bridge yet again, focusing intently on the security systems he put in place after the attack on Hoth. Monitors along the outer hull of the ship kept careful watch for anyone who might approach, with additional shielding on the airlock door that would activate in the event anyone attempted to access the ship without clearance to do so. Pierce and Broonmark were tasked as well, to ensure there were weapons within easy reach in all rooms inside of the ship. The crew would not be caught off-guard again, he vowed.

He straightened when he heard someone stepping inside the doorway of the bridge, turned to face the Pureblood visage of the Darth his lord was duty-bound to protect. Quinn nodded at Darth Vowrawn, "My lord. Is there something you were in need of?"

"Oh, no. I was simply exploring. Lord Lusiel has such a unique and interesting assortment of people that she calls her own. And you can tell so much about a person simply by looking at what sort of people she allows close to her. Don't you agree?" Vowrawn's gaze was sharp, directly appraising as he looked at Quinn. The Imperial forced himself to remain relaxed, to keep from tensing or otherwise appearing alarmed.

But Quinn's mind was spinning. Darth Vowrawn's place on the Dark Council had him focused normally on concerns mattering to production and logistics, gathering the necessary supplies and essential stuffs the Empire needed in order to sustain itself and grow stronger, in fact. That didn't mean he wouldn't take time to consider _other_ concerns the Council might worry after. Such as the rising strength and power of a young Sith Lord.

It was imperative, Quinn knew, that he not say or do anything that could allow a threat to come to his own lord. "Lord Lusiel has tremendous respect for strength and capability in her followers, my lord. Their talents are prodigious. You can rest assured of your safety. My Lord Lusiel will exceed any expectation you might offer her."

Vowrawn purred at him, "Such loyalty is impressive, captain. I wonder what's won it. You've tied yourself very firmly to Lord Lusiel. I was curious if it was mere personal gain that had you marry her. Now, though. I have to wonder."

Quinn's eyes only flickered, so briefly even Vowrawn nearly missed it. Impressive again, the Darth thought. Quinn's response was careful, slow, "I'm bound in loyalty and duty to Lord Lusiel. Have no doubt, my lord."

"No, I don't doubt you in the least, actually. You know, the Council can, in some cases, set aside the marriages of those Sith Lords it deems necessary to do so." Quinn's heart raced, but he forced himself to breathe. "Of course, Lord Lusiel is not just any Sith Lord. She's the Emperor's Wrath. The Wrath is autonomous of the Council's will and control, answering only to the Emperor himself."

Quinn wasn't certain what Darth Vowrawn was trying to say. So he remained quiet, only watching Vowrawn as the Pureblood regarded him.

Vowrawn murmured, "Lord Qet would make a fine husband for such a warrior as the Wrath."

Quinn dropped his gaze, desperately hiding the thrill of anger that went through him at the thought. After so much, to lose her? Everything in him screamed denial. The feeling was pure, powerfully raw. Visceral even. And somewhere inside him, deep in his mind, an awareness stirred and stretched itself protectively.

Vowrawn murmured, so that Quinn glanced up at him, with his eyes dark blue and glinting. "How interesting. I feel her _there_." The Pureblood nodded, as if coming to a decision. "I see, then. Very well, captain. I think you should know that I like you. I will speak well of you to Darth Marr, in fact. I believe the Wrath's husband should hold a position of rank in the military at least comparable to her own."

Quinn frowned as he watched Vowrawn turn to leave the bridge. The Darth stopped, looked back at him. "I'll inform Lord Qet to remain mindful of Lord Lusiel's marriage. I appreciate having the time to get to know you, captain."

Quinn watched as Darth Vowrawn left, and then he turned back to the consoles, taking several deep breaths as he tried to calm himself once again. He felt like he'd just won some kind of battle. If only he could figure out _what_ and _how_.

___________________________________

Lusiel frowned as she watched the scenery flying by through the windows of the tram, looking at the ruins of Coronet City and the desperate fighting that persisted down every street and in every window of all the devastated buildings and alleyways. She moved towards the end of the tram, settled down onto her knees to meditate. Jaesa respected her need for privacy and turned away to watch the battle as they zoomed along.

" _Malavai_ ," she thought, her feelings of calm smoothing towards her husband quietly. She felt his response through the bond, aware that whatever threat to him had caught her attention was already past. Quinn was relaxing.

Lusiel gathered herself once again. She pulled her commlink out to regard Quinn's message again, listened to him describing the security measures he was monitoring to ensure Vowrawn's safetly, his voice a comforting balm in a sea of battlefields and desperate fighting. "Have no concerns. We will ensure Darth Vowrawn's safety for you." Then he paused. "Be well. _My_ lord."

She smiled, just as the tram began to slow. Only Quinn could convey the strength of his emotions by merely intoning her title in just the right way. She'd repay him for that, she promised herself, as she climbed back to her feet and joined Jaesa near the doors of the tram. "Come, Jaesa. Time to introduce myself to yet another one of Baras' moles."

___________________________________

Lusiel leaned over the security console, just outside the shielded door leading to the bunker where the Republic Colonel Senks, actual servant of fat, vile and doomed Darth Baras, was currently huddling in terrified splendor. Behind her, she could just make out the sound of one last dying soldier, begging Jaesa for his life. "Please, don't! No!" His dying gurgles sounded wetly then, and Jaesa came to stand next to her.

Lusiel used the device Vette had given her earlier at the taxi transport, the one loaded with Quinn's calculations that should deactivate the security measures and passages Senks was counting on for his escape. Jaesa chuckled as the scan completed in mere moments, all the lights on the device trilling green. The shield over the door sputtered and disappeared.

"Perfect, my lord. It's times like this, I'm glad we have him."

"Oh, yes. Quinn definitely has some spectacular uses."

Jaesa only smiled at Lusiel, "Use him well, my lord."

"We should probably hurry this along, then."

The women stepped into the room, locating Senks where he was huddled over a large console muttering about why his security was failing so dramatically. The poor fellow was in near tears, almost pounding the console in his frustration.

Baras, you fool, Lusiel thought. He'd clung to idiots like this one, rather than win and hold onto the ones with _real_ talent. Because it was Quinn's genius that undid Senks' work in mere seconds. Lusiel wanted to laugh at the thrill of victory that went through her at the thought, that Quinn was hers. That she'd won him away from Baras. And when she finally killed Darth Baras, it would be with Quinn standing next to her. How utterly delicious.

"The reason your security is failing just broke into your command center, Senks," Lusiel stood facing the man when he finally spun around to see her. His face went white as he looked at her standing there with her arms crossed across her chest.

"You beat my tech! How … I mean, I figured you’d cut down all the soldiers. But I never imagined you were smarter than me, too," Senks stumbled out from behind the console, stuttering. Lusiel watched his eyes darting crazily as he tried to find some way, any way out of the disaster standing right in front of him. Jaesa didn’t help him out, either. She activated her saber and pattered sideways to get a better position to cut him down. Senks yelped, "No! Don't kill me! Please! I'm an Imperial agent, really! Ask Darth Baras – he’s on the Dark Council itself!"

Lusiel sneered at him, "That's worse than being Republic. Baras is slime!" She watched Senks blanch even more. He looked like paste, like he was already dead and wilting right in front of her. At least he was familiar enough with Sith politics to appreciate the sensitivity of his current position, she thought.

But Senks was a survivor, first and foremost. He prided himself on always finding a bolthole. He would find one this time round, he had to! "Are you one of the rogue Sith Darth Baras tried to keep in line?" Lusiel rolled her eyes. "Well, okay, then. Maybe not. But surely you wouldn't threaten the Empire's course in the war, would you?"

"You're determined to find some way to needle me into letting you live, aren't you, Senks? Vowrawn told me you had a particular talent for survival. That could prove useful, perhaps." Lusiel pointed at him with the end of her lightsaber, prodded enough that Senks jumped backwards to keep the burning tip of her weapon from touching him.

"Darth Vowrawn? I know about him!” Senks gulped, “He should understand I'm essential in the fight for Corellia. I steer Republic-aligned resistance forces into battles they can't win. Shut me down and we lose this war, I mean it!"

Lusiel grunted at him, "Let’s see if you survive the next few minutes. That should be an entertaining game, at least. Give me the information, the secrets you've gathered for Baras, and we'll see."

Senks grew even paler, his features looking more and more like those of a trapped rodent in a maze. He tunneled his fingers through his short hair. "He'll kill me, my lord."

"I'm systematically tearing Baras down. I'm still here. I'll be the one who finally stands on Baras' dead face, I assure you. Whether you're still alive to see me, then, is totally up to you. But choose quickly. Now."

Senks lowered his chin, thinking. He blurted suddenly, "All right! I understand." He moved towards the console, his fingers dancing across the buttons. "As Darth Vowrawn told you, I _survive_. I have to be on the winning side before it all comes crashing down." He worked carefully, "Here. These are the files I prepared for Baras. Now they're yours. Is that good enough to earn your mercy?"

"I'm not fool enough to take your word for it, Senks. Wait a moment." Lusiel approached the holoterminal and keyed in the information to connect her to the Wing. She watched Darth Vowrawn's image take shape over the console. "My lord, I'm transmitting the information from Colonel Senks' files."

He smiled back at her, relieved that their plan was so successful. "Excellent. Let me have your captain pull them up for me." He paused, leaning over slightly as if reading through materials in front of him. "Yes, indeed. This was the leverage Baras was using against several of my fellow Council members. They're now free of him."

Senks waved a hand towards Vowrawn. "Pardon me. Does this mean I can keep breathing?"

Vowrawn looked towards Lusiel, shrugging. He'd told her he was interested in retaining Senks as an asset but wanted her to verify the man's usefulness. Lusiel nodded back at him, subtly. Then she turned to Senks. "Colonel Senks, meet your new master," Lusiel pointed towards Vowrawn's image.

The Darth eyed the so-called Republic officer. "You heard her, colonel. Your tenure under Darth Baras has ended. You answer to _me_ now. Is that understood?" Senks fell over himself, swearing loyalty. Lusiel smiled darkly at the man as she mentally removed another one of Baras’ game pieces from the board.

So much closer to checkmate, Baras.


	108. Come out, come out wherever you are!

Shadow's head was pounding so hard, his ears ringing steadily, that he couldn't even tell, at first, that the artillery bombardment had stopped. The shelling had been so steady, so regular he'd actually become accustomed to it, he thought. Only now he realized the abnormal effect the barrage of artillery fire had on his senses.

He eyed the computer readouts he was working on blearily, trying to ignore the whimpering cries of wounded soldiers lying in the next room and the doctors working over them yelling out for various supplies and implements. The sounds of the battle – shots firing, soldiers yelling – that didn't stop, either.

His damn teeth felt like they were coming loose, he thought dully, as he rubbed at them with the tip of his tongue. And that's when he saw a pair of blurred figures coming at him through the nearby doorway. Horrified he'd allowed his normally keen senses to go so lax, he snatched up his pistol and fired off a shot in some mad dash of movement. He heard a feminine shout, saw the two figures weaving. He crowed, "Hah! I'll shoot you dead if you don't move fast to identify yourself!"

That's when Shadow heard a growling sound of anger. Then he felt a dull thud against his side, as his pistol was ripped out of his hands and sent flying. He heard it hit the wall off to the side and break into a good dozen pieces. He looked around frantically, trying to figure out who was close enough to have struck at him so solidly. But there wasn’t anyone. Just the outline of a woman standing in front of him, alongside a taller feminine companion who was leaning over and rubbing at a spot along her upper thigh.

He could hear the one woman complaining, "He missed, master. But only barely. I have a damn burn hole in my robe!" Then she looked over at Shadow, "I liked this robe, you fool!"

The smaller woman snarled at him again – she was just taller than Shadow's shoulder, and he was a slight man, "You'd better think twice before threatening me or mine again, idiot."

Shadow frowned. He was confused. Did they say something about robes? He blinked at them. "What? Speak up, dammit! I can't hear you over this stupid ringing in my ears!"

He heard an exasperated snarl this time and the small woman stepped forward, her hand coming up. "Let me help you with your ringing ears." And Shadow was suddenly held up in the air, as a silent and deadly force compelled him up and then began shaking him back and forth. He gripped at his throat, kicking his feet with futile effort, and thinking, "Robes! Sith! I'm so done." What a stupid way to die, idiotically attacking a fucking Sith in the middle of a battle zone. He actually considered arguing, or maybe playing purely, stupidly dumb. But the shaking was making his head hurt even more and he only ended up whining pitifully.

Suddenly she dropped him. Because that's who was holding him up so forcefully, the small dark-haired woman in the gray and black robes trimmed in red. Such power in such a small frame boggled the mind. Shadow climbed wearily back to his feet, holding his head in his hands and groaning in pain. "Sorry, my lord. So damn sorry, I swear it. The artillery has me rattled."

She shrugged. "I destroyed the Republic batteries. It shouldn't be long before it quiets down, here. Although the battle seems to be quite fierce even now." She pointed at him. "None of which matters to me. I need the information you've been gathering for Darth Vowrawn."

"Of course, my lord." Shadow tossed his shoulders back and began describing the information he'd been working with during so much of the last days. He squared himself when he admitted he wasn't certain which Jedi in the group of them coming to Coronet City was, in fact, spying for Baras. Surely she'd punish him for not discovering the truth.

But she only shook her head at him, "I'll just kill them all."

Shadow eyed her carefully, rubbing his neck. He'd never heard of anyone so blithely willing to take on an entire room full of Jedi, and that after running a gauntlet of Republic troopers, to boot. But if anyone could do it, he imagined it would be this particular Sith, he decided. Gods, what a terrifying woman.

______________________________________

Lusiel winked at Jaesa as the Jedi gathered loomingly around them. Jaesa grinned back at her, eagerly looking forward to Lusiel's newest game, a “seek the weasel” event they detailed together during the course through to the bunker where the Jedi were hunkered.

Now Jaesa pointed towards the burned hole in her lower robe, reminding Lusiel of their wager. Because Lusiel would have to replace Jaesa’s lower robe if she failed to flush Baras’ spy from among the Jedi in time enough. Lusiel grinned as she playfully clawed through the air, rather. Jaesa would make sure Broonmark received an appropriate gift if Lusiel did find the spy, anyway. The sheer entertainment value of watching Jaesa trying to please the Talz was well worth the hassle of the game, Lusiel insisted.

Stars above, but she had a purely difficult time keeping her beastly Talz satisfied. Well, unless you counted basically giving him Vette, Lusiel mentally shrugged.

Lusiel glanced around her at the neat little circle of Jedi – three of them, all Masters – and their tiny cadre of troopers. The Jedi pressed in against her, imposing on her most personal space as they loomed. She shifted her gaze between each one, gauging them through the force. But none of them was so easily unmasked. Lusiel heard Jaesa chuckling softly, and she shot her apprentice a warning glance.

Then the Miraluka activated his lightsaber, sending a blue glow humming gently across the space that divided them. He gestured at her with the weapon, "You've failed, Sith. There's no way you'll defeat all three of us. Surrender. It's your only chance."

Lusiel rolled her eyes towards him. Why every Jedi persisted in offering her surrender continued to amaze her. After killing the first two or three Jedi who did, she imagined they would realize she wasn’t going to give up any fight. But like the most tenacious weeds, they kept unfurling their precious white flags at her like she would suddenly change her mind. She might admire their sheer stubborn persistence. But she only eyed the Miraluka’s lightsaber as he pointed it towards her.

No, she decided. It was just regular dumb stupidity. Just Jedi being Jedi, basically. Lusiel rolled her shoulder in slow disdain of each one of them, "I’m not sure which one of you is loyal to Darth Baras. Only declare it now, or die along with the others. It doesn’t really matter much to me, either way." Jaesa sighed with admiration for the gambit.

The oldest of the three, a human, shook his head at her through an expression of the most incredible bewilderment, “You honestly believe one of us would defend the Empire? You must be mad."

"A pitiful attempt to divide us, Rubatin. She’s desperate," the Miraluka continued waving his lightsaber, frowning heavily under the brief blindfold he wore over his useless eyes. Lusiel wondered why their faces would retain the shape of eyes, when they no longer developed them. Such mind-boggling creatures, she thought.

"Your time’s nearly done, master," Jaesa called out just then. Her apprentice was nearly trembling with excitement at the thought of coming out the winner in any contest with Lusiel, actually. Lusiel playfully batted her foot against Jaesa’s in admonishment. Because she was still determined to win the game, of course.

Lusiel threw back her shoulders, "Final warning, my fellow Sith. Step forward, or die with these prattling nuisances. I’m growing quite bored, obviously." And that’s when the last of these Jedi raised up her hand, whining to her. Lusiel breathed in slowly as she regarded the smallish human woman with an upraised eyebrow, realized she was even smaller than Lusiel herself. Was it a defect of her birth, Lusiel wondered.

"Wait! Don't!" The woman slid out from behind the Miraluka, stepped closer to Lusiel with frantic fervor. "Oh, I've heard of you, many of the Jedi talk of you on Tython. I should tell you about her …" Rubatin yelped with alarm, "What do you think you’re doing, Master Injaye? No! Don’t!"

But the tiny woman only laughed, "Gods, I’ll be so glad when I can finally return home. I’ll be remembered a hero, rather than waste my talents under your blasted rules and absurd strictures. You might as well tie each other with ropes, you’re so much useless on Tython!” She ignored the two men with their sad sounds, the way Rubatin swung around sideways until he stood between them both with Lusiel along one length of his shoulder and Injaye the other. Injaye bypassed him to get closer to Lusiel though, “I am so looking forward to the destruction you’ll visit here today, I swear it.”

Lusiel glanced at Jaesa, smirking. She said, “Broonmark.”

Jaesa glared over at Injaye through crystalline yellow eyes, "You always win. It’s so not fair! Is it a trick?" Lusiel shrugged smoothly, "Practice, my apprentice. Only lots of practice." Then Jaesa growled as she launched herself through the air towards the troopers behind the Jedi, swinging the glowing golden blades of her lightsaber staff as she went. Jaesa saw the crimson arch of her master’s lightsaber flying beneath her, heard it singing as Lusiel flung it rapidly along the same course. One of the troopers screamed shrilly when the red glow embedded itself deep in his chest, right before Lusiel pulled back through the Force to retrieve the weapon.

Jaesa yelled out as she landed in the middle of the last of the troopers and spun in a terrible, cacophonous whirl of double-bladed fury that wounded and ripped at the remaining men, “Oh, come on! You didn’t tell me it was a _race_ , too!”

Lusiel smiled thinly as she sauntered sideways in front of the three masters, told them, “The only one I’m truly interested in killing here today is you, Injaye. Although I do appreciate you outing yourself so ostentatiously; it netted me a wager with my apprentice, as you can see.” Rubatin tried calling out, tried saving the pitiful woman. But Lusiel was already too close and her lightsaber flew up to glow hotly against Injaye’s tender throat, saw her eyes wide with unshed tears of panic as she begged, “Why? I didn’t falter even once, was always loyal …” Lusiel shook her head, “Ask Baras, after he joins you. It won’t be long, trust me.”

Rubatin screamed out, "No!"  He held up his hand, desperation marking his features. But Lusiel whipped her lightsaber sideways against Injaye’s neck, leaving her head to tumble down onto the rug beneath their feet with the small thump before it rolled across the floor. Lusiel whirled to face Rubatin’s angry rush then, swung her saber up to meet Rubatin’s downward swing of his blade towards her own head.

Lusiel danced back out of his reach, swinging her red lightsaber towards his Miralukan frame so he stumbled to a halt just outside her reach. She snapped out at him, “You Jedi. Never grateful when someone chops the heads off the snakes in your own midst! Weak-willed pansies!” Rubatin didn’t rise to anger against her jibes. His grief was aching through the Force to her, actually.

Jaesa confronted the Miraluka somewhere behind her, and Lusiel heard him crying out a curse in his own language. She smiled, “My apprentice will take him down and then you’ll be alone, Rubatin. All alone now.” Rubatin looked over her shoulder towards the other battle, and his eyes flew wide open. Jaesa was pressing the Miraluka hard, forcing him back and against the hard wall of the bunker with the steady precision born of countless sparring sessions with her master. Her two-handed lightsaber sang and whirred in her hands, and she yelled in happy cadence with the weapon, crying out, "Bleed like a sour nerf, you pitiful fool!" Then her blade flashed out and down, smoothly taking the Miraluka's left leg so that he tumbled with a shriek towards the floor.

Rubatin exclaimed as the younger Jedi fell, yelling. "Don't kill him!" Jaesa looked over at him, her eyebrows raised up in question. Then she glanced down at the pitifully wounded man in front of her, "Master?"

Rubatin looked at her, imploring. Lusiel shrugged, looking back at Rubatin without care. "Why are you even asking, Jaesa?" And Jaesa laughed aloud as her lightsaber went up and over the Miraluka's head, before smashing down over him. He cried out just once as the blade cut through his neck and shoulder, silencing him utterly.

The last Jedi stared at Lusiel sadly, "You will someday regret this."

Lusiel shook her head, though. "No. I won’t. Rather, you have your peace, Jedi. And the force will free _me_." That's when she leaped, her lightsaber twisting out and around this last Jedi Master. Rubatin stumbled back, still shocked at the quick deaths of his friends. But he squared himself in time, lashing his lightsaber against Lusiel's red blade in a stinging song.

The two danced together in battle, their blades sparking one against the other. Lusiel pressed him, her heart beating, racing. She felt anger thrilling through her, stepped into the attack, beating at Rubatin with bitterness and rage. Her anger grew, built – the rage beat at her, consumed her.

And then she stumbled, her eyes going wide as she realized, finally, that the anger wasn’t hers. Quinn! Her heart raced, beat hard with panic suddenly. Pulsing, pulsing! The bond that connected them sang the terrible warning.

_Attacked_ , she thought. Lusiel’s head fell backwards and she roared her fury towards the ceiling over her head. Screamed her rageful intention! Rubatin stumbled back and away from her, his eyes wide in shock, but Lusiel came at him like a wild dervish, bitter and enraged. She was faster than Jaesa could run at the fight, even.

Her lightsaber flashed against Rubatin, the power of the blow slicing through the hilt of his blade and taking both his hands where they were clasped together to hold his weapon, embedding in the Jedi's torso just above his belly before his lightsaber even hit the floor.

Rubatin grunted, staring down at the length of lightsaber extending through his body. He felt blood pulsing from between his lips, heard the squelch of liquid that stole his last words. Lusiel yanked her lightsaber free, watched as the Jedi fall dead at her feet. Jaesa stared at her quietly, watching her pant through a brow dotted with perspiration.

"They've attacked my people again, Jaesa. They've attacked Quinn. He's _injured_."


	109. Cipher Nine

Alarms were peeling as Lord Qet gripped Quinn's arm under his shoulder and pulled him back and away from the airlock. The Imperial officer grunted up at him, obviously in severe pain, "The shield is holding! Ensure Darth Vowrawn is secure in the medical bay, my lord, quickly! Vette! Come here, Vette!"

Quinn felt himself shaking as he pushed Lord Qet away. The Sith nodded, rumbling, "You've saved my lord's life. You have my gratitude." Quinn only stared at him, before shaking his head, "I haven't saved him yet, my lord. But I will. I vow it." He called the twi'lek's name again, barely watching Qet rush towards the medical bay. At least he hadn’t needed warning Pierce; that’s where the soldier dragged the Darth just as soon as the attack started and now stood careful guard just inside the doorway, there.

Quinn hissed as he examined his thigh, the blood that ran down his leg from the gash where a ragged piece of the hull had ripped the flesh during the explosion of the airlock doors. The only thing keeping the assassin from entering the ship now was the energy shielding Quinn had prepared around the airlock. And even that would eventually fail, he thought, listening to what sounded like a lightsaber bashing against the shield, the ringing static of the blows crackling behind the continued blaring of the alarms.

" _Malavai. You're hurt_." Quinn frowned, disregarding the thought of her voice as he concentrated on the more immediate threat.

Whoever it was outside the ship, he was relying upon brute force rather than any sort of technical expertise, much like the way Draahg infiltrated the ship on Hoth, actually. He only bashed his way inside. It's exactly why Quinn implemented such a sophisticated shield. However, he doubted the technology would last for any great length of time if a Sith assassin was particularly determined, enraged, or just that powerful a warrior.

And the guards and soldiers normally protecting the spaceport would scatter in the face of a Sith, too, completely unwilling to interfere in any sort of Sith battle or fight. The crew was on its own and would have to rely upon their own devices.

"Quinn!" He turned around when Vette called his name, saw her rushing towards him, with both her blue lekku swinging around her. She yelped, "Geez, you're bleeding like a slaughtered nerf! Again! Oh! She's going to _kill_ someone!"

Quinn shook his head, shaking off the lightheadedness. He was losing too much blood, he thought. " _Malavai_!" He forced himself to focus on the twi’lek, "Not now, Vette." He yanked her arm, pulling her close enough to him he could whisper down into the bud of her ear, "Call _him_. We need someone to get the assassin away from the ship so we can get the Darth out of the spaceport. Hurry."

Vette didn't waste time. She nodded as she yelled towards Broonmark to hold Quinn up while the captain fumbled at preparing a kolto probe for his leg. The droid started to whirl over the injury as she activated commlink. There was not even some hesitation; the signal was immediately picked up and Vette watched as the image of her dark-haired _friend_ appeared in front of her. He frowned at her, "Vette? What's going on?"

"So I saw you in the spaceport. Ice cream’s a bitch to unload, by the by. Except now we’re … I think it’s a Sith outside. Hard to hear much over his banging on the hull," Vette spoke quickly, even as the alarms blared. Broonmark, nearby, warbled something about Quinn's leg, "Humans bleed too much, they’re weak and little. And ugly."

"Who's hurt? What's happened?" The agent was angry enough he spoke direct and firmly at her. Vette just shrugged at him, "Quinn, of course. Seems there's always something happening to make him bleed lately. Lusiel is going to be pissed! But she won't get here in time to kill the assassin trying to get inside the ship, either."

"Stand by," she saw him leaning over, apparently talking to someone. Then he addressed her again. "We're on the way, Vette. We'll flank the assassin, draw him off. Be prepared to move." Vette watched as his image disappeared, shaking her head when she realized he didn’t even stop to ask who or why. Like it didn’t even matter. He only stopped and came as soon as he was needed.

"Hurry!” Quinn staggered, but he still shouted strongly down the hallway, “Ensure Darth Vowrawn is secured for transit. Pierce!" Quinn limped towards the medical bay. The soldier leaned his head towards Quinn, nodding. "You and Broonmark will have to provide secure positions flanking Darth Vowrawn as we move. He's already described a safe house he has in the government district of the city, but it will take us at least an hour to get there. Make sure no one gets close to the Darth as we're moving. Do you understand?"

Pierce grunted, "Damn straight, captain."

Vowrawn watched the crew's motions with unfettered and open curiosity. They moved precisely, methodically. There was no argument, just weapons gathered together and armors buckled into place, each member of the crew falling into the designated roles Quinn described to them without a single bit of hesitation. Quinn approached the Darth, still limping, "My lord, please follow me."

Vowrawn considered the Imperial, noted the pinched look on his face, as well as the determined turn of his brow as he motioned. The man would keep going forward, and nevermind the pain he was enduring. The Darth smiled at him, delighted and impressed, "Of course, captain. Lead on."

Quinn moved quickly, biting the inside of his cheek against the pain in his leg. The pounding on the airlock doors had stopped suddenly mere moments before, and now they waited. Quinn grunted when he heard a familiar voice yelling out to him, "Now, captain! Move! He's on the run!" Quinn moved fast, releasing the airlock's shield before gesturing for the others to follow him.

"Wait! How do we know these people are trustworthy?" Lord Qet peered outside, towards the two men, human by the looks of them, that were standing at the bottom of the ramp. One was black-haired, handsome. He lifted a rifle as he turned to look up at them, waved forthrightly. The other man had strange-looking eyes, completely blackened. Qet scowled at them both, hesitating.

" _I_ trust him. Let's go," Quinn didn't hesitate. He limped quickly down the ramp.

The agent spun around to face him, his dark eyes moving quickly to Quinn's torn leg. He grumbled, shouldered his rifle and moved quickly to shoulder Quinn's frame. The group rushed through the docking bay. Pierce and Broonmark flanked Vowrawn carefully, with Broonmark snarling at the all-black-eyed male human that offered the Darth assistance. "Move away," said the Talz, until the stranger nodded and fell back to take up a more defensible position. Near Vette.

Quinn called over his shoulder, "Vette! Speeders, now!"

The twi'lek jumped forward. She keyed in the controls for the speeder Lusiel relied upon when on-planet, as the agent settled Quinn inside and pointed towards the Darth that he climb in the back. Vowrawn asked, "Is the captain's leg repairable?" The agent crouched over Quinn's leg in the front of the speeder, as Vette maneuvered the vehicle through the damaged streets and around various debris piles. The rest of the group used smaller one-man speeders to flank their own vehicle.

"Don’t worry, my lord.” He worked fast to get Quinn’s bleeding under control, his fingers moving unerringly against the torn, shredded edges of the wound. “My father ensured I could attend the very best medical training schools in the Empire. I do believe healing’s in my blood, although my sister can’t set a broken finger. So don’t ask her to,” he quipped, grinning over Quinn’s shoulder towards the Dark Council lord.

Vowrawn chuckled, "What's your name, agent?"

Quinn answered for him, sighing, "He’s called Cipher Nine. He’s my lord’s brother."

" _I'll_ kill _them_."

He didn't doubt her.


	110. Little Brother

Khyriel was the only one who was ever able to sneak up on her. When they were children, it was a game they played together, as he became more and more adept at hiding from their mother’s notice. His skill at ferreting out whatever spot she was using to secret herself out of his detection never ceased to amaze her. She considered several times that his skills at subterfuge and maneuvering was, in fact, a sort of Force ability all its own. She wasn't surprised he excelled in his line of work, either.

As it was, though, she had long since stopped jumping when he did manage to sneak up on her. Regardless of his ability to find her, to sneakily approach her wherever she happened to be, the fact remained she never felt any sort of threat where Khyriel was concerned. So when his hands came up to grip her arms and yank her back against his chest now, as he laughed against the shell of her ear, she only elbowed him in the stomach and stomped her booted foot in mock anger.

"Khy! Damn you! Tell me you didn't sleep with Vette!" She spun around to begin poking him in the chest with one of her long, slender fingers.

"All right. I didn't."

"You're lying!"

"Well, if you know that, why do you want me to say otherwise?" He rolled his eyes oh so dramatically. She stomped her foot again, growling at him.

Khyriel laughed, "You know you love me. Besides. It worked exactly as I expected … Helped save your captain. He would've bled out otherwise.” He leaned his dark head sideways as he considered, “Mind you, I’m pretty certain he would’ve crawled along the floor even if he’d lost every single drop of blood in his body – that man is a deadly-focused sort, on getting the job done."

She pursed her lips, trying to hide the tendrils of anxiety that still whipped in her, "Then he's well now?"

He held a hand over his heart, dramatically appalled. "Oh, you wound me! Don't you know how skilled I am?" She only stared at him, and he finally dropped his playful banter to regard her seriously. Khyriel cupped her shoulders gently with both hands, leaning down until he could see directly into her eyes. They regarded each other, their eyes so similar. Like two pools of chocolate melting together. And he whispered to her, “He’s absolutely fine. There won’t even be a scar, mind you. It took me a few hours, only because there was an arterial bleed I had to repair as we were moving. He was sleeping when I left Darth Vowrawn’s safe house.” Then he pulled her up against him, held her close to him.

Lusiel rested her head against his shoulder for a moment, enjoying the feel of her brother’s form there in front of her. Their meetings in recent years had been hurried events, like this one. Brief moments where they managed to bypass each other so quickly, so fast they almost didn’t manage time enough to talk, let alone embrace.

Then she punched him in the stomach, listened to him huff a laugh. "I'm still mad about Vette, damn it! She told me you're married! Why didn't you tell me?"

Khyriel chuckled, "You didn't invite me to your wedding, either. It hurt my feelings." Lusiel scoffed, “Oh no, I did send you a message! And I warned you on Nar Shaddaa what I intended! You never spoke of a wife, though!”

Khyriel rubbed his stomach slowly, smiling at his sister, "It was rather unexpected, actually. Very much last minute, just after I left Belsavis. Have you _seen_ the craziness happening there?"

"Don’t try to distract me, Khy! Who is this female?” Lusiel started pacing, “Do you trust her? Is she …”

Khyriel held up both his hands, laughing lightly as he tried turning the conversation away from his wife. Talking over details of her history right there in public was not high on his list of “acceptable courses of action”. Ever, actually. Family matters were best saved for private family spaces, after all. “No time, Lou. And I’m not sure how long I will remain on Corellia, either. Matters here are … complicated. I will come looking for you soon, though. I promise."

Lusiel sighed in understanding, "You will bring her then?"

He looked away, over at his Joiner friend, "Oh by all means. We can’t have fun stuff without the whole clan gathered up in one place, right? Blood’s so very important.” Lusiel frowned suddenly, leaned forward intentfully. But then Jaesa yelled over at her, "Master!" Lusiel watched her running towards them, her face frantic. Khyriel chuckled against her ear, "You didn't get on the taxi fast enough, Lou."

"Please stop calling me that. We’re not children anymore."

"But it's so cute."

"I'm not supposed to be cute. I'm supposed to be frightening."

He looked her up and down. "Lou, you will _never_ be frightening to me. Hey, you barely come up as high as my shoulder, even." Lusiel sighed loudly just as Jaesa reached them. Khyriel smiled at her apprentice hugely then, "Well, aren't you a pretty thing." But Jaesa scowled back at him, "I'm not a pretty thing. I'm dangerous!"

Khyriel laughed, "Hah! She's definitely _yours_ , Lusiel. You’re teaching her so well."

_____________________________________

Lord Qet met her at the door of Vowrawn's safe house. She glanced around the apartments, taking in the fountain pulsing a smooth stream of water in the foyer and the plush carpets on the floors. "Lord Lusiel, come. Darth Vowrawn is expecting you."

Lusiel glanced back towards Jaesa, canted her head. Her apprentice nodded, turning towards one of the side corridors. She could make out the outline of Pierce's frame outside one of the doors towards the end of the hallway and moved towards him quickly. He grunted as Jaesa approached, turning to knock on the door, calling, "Captain. She's here, wants you. Better get out here."


	111. I should have done better!

Quinn stepped into the room, just as Vowrawn burst out laughing. "Things are heating up, aren't they? Baras has really taken off the sparring gloves! This assassin was the most lethal to date." The Darth glanced up when he noticed Quinn standing in the doorway, saw him watching the small figure of his wife hungrily.

Why did Lusiel always look smaller and more delicate after he'd not seen her for several days? Quinn shook his head in bewilderment as he stepped closer. Vowrawn was gesturing towards him, now.

"Your people are truly impressive, Lord Lusiel. Their talents are incredible enough when you speak of them. But to see them in action? They were so focused, so direct. Not one of them panicked or became confused. They literally stared death in the face and not once did they even flinch! If I thought you'd give them up, I'd take them from you."

"That won't happen, my lord," Lusiel turned, looking for Quinn. He subtly inclined his chin, heard her clearly. In his head. He heard her whisper his name there, and he stumbled slightly before righting himself. How did she keep managing such a thing? Vowrawn tittered, “See? Even a serious injury only barely keeps your captain from moving ever onward. He’s so fiercely loyal to you, you know. I asked for him.”

Lusiel hummed warmly, “And I’m sure that worked out quite well. To my own satisfaction, of course."

The Darth laughed again. Lusiel thought his sense of humor was gravely appealing. He likely manufactured over a great many years, effected it to keep his worst opponents off-balance and unaware. She wasn’t gulled by any of it, though. For now she was useful to him; that was all. Vowrawn smiled, "You play the game so nicely. I like you, Wrath."

She grinned back at him widely, "Isn't it wonderful that we get to work together?"

Vowrawn's fringe twitched as he chuckled, "And so we should consider our next steps. It's finally time we move against Baras' power here on Corellia." He looked over at Quinn, examining the length of his frame discerningly, "It's good that the captain is well enough to assist us even after the assassin wounded him so severely. Quinn really was magnificent, persisted even through the pain. He refused to give up."

Quinn clasped his hands behind his back, explained, "I'm still making up for an earlier failure, actually. I am committed to demonstrating my capabilities are improved."

Lusiel snorted, "You didn't fail as much as I did. It will never happen again, I’ve made steps to see to that."

Quinn's gaze went sharp suddenly, and his mouth opened as he looked at her. But Vowrawn only smiled again, "It's only failure when you die before winning. Otherwise, you merely succeeded using a different course, that’s all." Quinn dropped his eyes, staring at the floor as the two Sith blithely discussed the steps they would need to take to free an entity Baras was using to seize power that fueled his own efforts. His thoughts kept spinning, actually. Until Lusiel eyed him frowningly, and Quinn looked away to hide his thoughtfulness.

"Very well, then. I believe you require some time to rest, Lord Lusiel. Gather your strength, and then we’ll be off." Vowrawn nodded towards them both before he walked out of the room. Lusiel waited until he was gone, watching her husband. She asked him once they were alone, "What's the matter?"

"Darth Vowrawn provided quarters, my lord. You really should take some time to rest. Jaesa indicated you were involved in a fierce fight with three powerful Jedi."

She waved her hand, "That was nearly two days ago. Yet I had to wait until my brother approached me to know that you were well. What’s wrong, Quinn?"

He gestured, waving for her to follow him. She moved along with him down the hallway towards a more private series of rooms. She glanced around curiously as they entered the space, "Did _you_ rest earlier, Quinn?" He frowned at her, "Your brother is exceedingly skilled, far beyond anything I’ve ever seen. Was your father as impressive?"

She raised her chin, frowning at the neat evasion, "No. My father was well aware that Khyriel was exceptional, rather. He provided measures to utilize every bit of my brother’s remarkable aptitudes, in fact."

Quinn leaned back onto his heels, looked at her. "As if he knew he would not survive, even." Lusiel shrugged, “The Force makes its motions, eddies in its own way. What my father knew, or didn’t know I can’t begin to say. He protected my brother well, though.”

Quinn’s brow scrunched into a tough frown, “You’re protective in the same way.”

Lusiel swallowed. She looked away from him, "I should have protected you better."

"Lusiel." He stepped closer to her, "Tell me. Explain to me why I hear your voice sometimes, even though no one else can. Why I feel as if there's some understanding only just beyond my appreciation. Like I should know it but just can’t seem to grasp at it … What's going on?"

She looked at him. Her brown eyes seemed darker than ever as she considered him, "Vette was right. I only assumed you would understand."

"Understand?"

"Ah, Quinn," Lusiel moved over to the bed, sat down on its edge. She watched him, her head tilted as she considered. "Tell me about Hoth. Baras confronted you. What did he say? What did he _do_?"

He thought broodingly. Not his favorite memory, one of the rememberings he shoved into a darker room of his mind, rather. Quinn stated, "He tried offering me rank, prestige. I refused. So he threatened me. But I still refused. Then he became angry. I thought he would strike against me then, and I'd end up like that Lanklyn fellow, the one he choked through the Force when we were on Hoth before. But instead …" Quinn looked away from her, swallowed. "He tormented a girl, instead. Like you were scared, back on Alderaan. He told me he'd do that to you, that he'd defeat you and hurt you the same way. Over and over again, he said."

"But, Quinn. I can defeat him! It's why he strikes at me from a distance so often! He fears my strength, my power."

"I know that! That's what I told him. But then …"

"What?"

"I don't know. I just … forgot. I don't understand why. I just thought there was no other way to save you from being hurt like that."

Lusiel sighed. She smoothed her fingers along the plaited edge of the bed coverings, "That's when he did it."

"Did what?"

She shook her head. "He corrupted your mind, Quinn. Like planting a poison. It convinced you to act as he willed. Only he had to provide you some impulse to believe in, first." He stared at her, "Then I’m a hindrance to you. I’m flawed, failed. He only has to do it again!"

Lusiel snorted, "Do you really think I would let him? Oh no, Quinn. I forced my way into your head and rooted every bit of filth he ever put there."

"But how easily could he reach my mind again? I’m a weakness to you, Lusiel! Don’t you see?"

Lusiel stood up, glaring hard at him. “No Sith or Jedi either will ever be able to lay a finger against your mind without me ripping them to shreds. I made certain of it. I am always there first, now!"

Quinn stopped, blinked at her as he remembered. The pain, the horrible, agonizing pain. The ripping across every bend and turn of his mind as he was pinned up against the wall. He remembered her voice whispering to him, whispering there in his very own mind, " _I almost have it, I'm right here_." He muttered, "You're in my mind. Right now. All the time."

She nodded, "Always. The bond will never be broken, I will always be a part of you. Given time, you might even manage to find me there, to see me and call me. I can already hear you easily enough."

He was still confused, though, "But didn’t you realize this sooner? Why didn’t you make such a bond, if you knew this was even a chance?" Wasn’t he important enough to protect, Quinn agonized. He could almost hear his father laughing at him through the long corridors of his memory, that he wasn’t good enough, would never be worthy enough. That he was nothing of value or substance; a worthless waste of time and effort, is all.

Lusiel's eyes darkened with distress as she murmured to him, "I'm sorry."

"Sorry?" He stared at her. Then his eyes became dark blue, stormy and angry. "Are you saying it could have all been prevented? Lusiel, do you even realize what I went through during those weeks?"

"Yes. I was there, I remember it."

"But you didn't stop it!"

"I didn't know, not in time! It was only a chance! But then I had to do everything so fast."

"But you knew what to do, because you had looked into it, studied it. You were prepared enough, but you didn’t do it! Gods, Lusiel. How could you have let me struggle like that?" Quinn started pacing in front of her. He was stunned to realize she really only wanted him for what he could do for her, that she didn’t care for him so much as what use he provided her. It hurt!

Lusiel clenched her fists, declared to him woodenly, "I'm sorry. It will never happen again. It … I was afraid." The words seemed like they were ripped from her, torn out from her throat and heavy in the air. A Sith afraid? But Quinn was reeling too badly to truly note how hard she struggled.

"Afraid?" Quinn scoffed at her angrily, "Apparently you weren't too afraid when it finally became obvious I wouldn’t be able to serve you properly. Gods … I wasn't able to even think straight, my head felt like it would explode practically every day, I couldn't sleep or eat – why didn't you stop it? Or better, kept it from happening at all! What were you thinking?"

Lusiel stared at him, like she was a stone statue. Like an automaton, "I failed you. I never will again. I swear it!" Quinn scoffed, turning his back to her as he ran his fingers through his hair agitatedly. Because he shouldn’t feel so blazing angry; in their world, she was the superior. His own subjugation was proper and correct.

But he suddenly realized he fooled himself in the belief they were unique. That he was of precious, unique worth to her. When all along, he wasn’t worthy of bond enough with her that she would come inside him. Quinn wanted to rage and pound something, but all he managed was to grip the both sides of his hair with brisk pulls of his hands.

He had to get away from her! Quinn muttered raggedly, "I have work to do, my lord. You should rest. Darth Vowrawn will be ready to seek out this entity within the next few hours." He turned away to leave the room.

Lusiel clenched her hands together, calling towards his back, "Don't leave me! Please." She sighed shakily, "Please, Malavai. I need you, I do. She watched him as he stood there, frozen with his back turned towards her, stiff and straight. Then he glanced back at her. He looked at her, took in her small frame, the way she clung to herself, her fingers crossed together. She was so beautiful. And all he could think was how many nights he agonized, when she could have prevented it entirely. Why she'd left him to such awful risk confounded him, infuriated him.

His eyes hardened, until they almost seemed like flinty bits of ice. She flinched even before he turned all the way back around and strode over to her.. He stood there, looming over her as she stared up at him. And he murmured to her so coldly, "Far be it for me – a mere Imperial – to deny you, my lord. What exactly is it you need of me, then? Tell me, so that I can get right to it. I’ll strip right here. I’ll even fuck you, yes. Order me, direct me! My lord!" He sneered at her!

Lusiel stared at him. He could see the color draining from her face, and he suddenly, terribly remembered how very young she was. Her eyes became desolate, filled with purest hurt. Like a girl-child kicked in the stomach, even. He reached out for her before he could stop himself, but she stumbled backwards rather than let him touch her. She fell against the bed and sat down very abruptly, practically falling into the cushions. Then she caught her lip so it didn’t quiver, turning away from him to hide the sheen of tears in her eyes.

"Lusiel …" Quinn’s punishment came in seeing her like that, seeing the hurt he’d done in every single line of her body as she crumpled against that bed. Even right then, he knew he would never forget it.

"I'm fine, captain. There's no need of you that I can possibly manage at the moment. Maybe later, I suppose. You're perhaps right, as usual. I should rest," she sounded so properly Sith. Austere, harsh. Quinn sighed, reaching out to touch her shoulder. But Lusiel yanked herself back from his reach and he heard her response shiver through his mind, " _Leave me alone_." Hearing her that way only reminded him, and Quinn stiffened again.

"Fine. I'll be nearby, my lord. Only command me, if you do happen to change your mind," Quinn spun around and marched out of the room. The door was just closing when he caught the sound of her muffling a sob.


	112. The Entity

Jaesa stomped into Darth Vowrawn’s grand kitchen, with its fine fixtures and ornate settings. Quinn glanced over at her, across from the table where he gathered together necessary supplies for the mission Vowrawn wanted him to attend with Lusiel. Vette was perched on the narrow back of a chair at the head of the table like a blasted bird giving them a show with her inane chatter, just to fill the silence. But Pierce and Broonmark were shoveling food into their mouths – it looked like smoked nerf with sauted cherbote root – only grunting every so often to let Vette know they weren't ignoring her.

Jaesa barely noted any of them, though.  She only snarled at Quinn, "What did you do?"

He shot one eyebrow up, continued stuffing his pack with supplies in that mechanically precise fashion that screamed out to all of them, “Don’t bother me, I’m working.” His irritation was obvious enough, even Vette was avoiding her regular witty jibes with him. It was quite enough a relief, Quinn was thinking he should become so upset routinely, just to get the twi’lek to shut up. Now he quirked an eyebrow at Lusiel’s apprentice, angry she had invaded his bubble of discontent, "This is none of your concern, Jaesa."

"Really? Because when something happens to her, we're _all_ affected. That's been my experience, anyway. So what the hell happened? She looks … terrible. She looks like someone fucking stabbed her!" Jaesa actually did kick the table, causing Pierce to grumble as he caught at the surface before the thing went flying, “She’s up there with Vowrawn right now.”

"Enough! This has nothing to do with you, Jaesa! Now, leave it be!" Quinn shouted. He actually shouted! Vette shook her head, muttering, "Wow, and here I am with no recording device even as Quinn has a meltdown." He shot her a glare as well, so that the twi'lek sat back with her blue hands held up in mock surrender.

Jaesa, though, had gone silent and deadly-looking. Pierce tried patting her, murmuring something. But she shook him off. Her golden eyes shot daggers at the captain even as she snarled, "Don't you dare talk to me like that, Imperial. I'm not my master. I don't give enough of a shit about you to care if I break you in half."

Quinn settled back on his heels, clasping his hands behind his back as he faced Jaesa with feigned respectfulness. But his eyes glinted with ire, "Of course, my lord. Please continue."

"Argh!" Jaesa began to pace, nearly twitching she was so angry. She muttered darkly to herself. Pierce glanced over at Quinn, "You're not helping, captain. You’re not supposed to piss off the Sithy ones!" Quinn only shrugged, his expression seemingly bored. But the look in his eyes was rough and hard, glittering angrily. Vette rocked herself forward until she tumbled down into the seat of the chair, trying to hide almost.

Jaesa suddenly spun around to face Quinn once again. "I know what this is, I helped her do it! You're mad at her for waiting so long; but you don’t even know why! Did you even ask her?”

Quinn couldn't help it. He dropped his chin, glaring at her, “I know why!” Jaesa's eyes widened. Then she laughed at him so meanly, "Oh, Quinn. You are such a fool."

Vette eyed Jaesa worriedly, trying desperately to soothe the situation. She said, "Maybe we should all take a break, try to calm down. Hey, are you hungry, Jaesa? I'm hungry. Did you see the cherbote root? It's awesome." Vette hated cherbote root. None of them reminded her, just looked up at Jaesa as she snarled again.

"It should've killed you, you ass!"

Quinn frowned at her uncertainly, suddenly confused. Vette only shook her head as she glanced down towards the table-top. At least Pierce and Broonmark still looked bewildered. Broonmark was still holding a spoonful of softened root vegetable frozen in midair, even. Quinn looked back at Jaesa.

"Every bit of reading we did, all the journals and texts. They all said that bonding with someone who couldn’t use the Force was dangerous, that it would probably kill you. Hell, even if you survived, it was likely your mind would be fractured, damaged.” Jaesa stomped her foot, glaring at him, “I will never forget the way she looked at you! You were lying on that table and she never once looked away. As if her whole world was lying there, broken and ruined because of what she’d had to do just to save you! She looked like she wanted to die!"

Jaesa glared at him. None of the others would even look at him, all of them glanced away as they remembered the scene. Jaesa fired her last, most deadly salvo then, “You arrogant piece of shit! All this time, everything she did was to protect you, to keep from hurting you that fucking much! But you? Oh no! You make this all about you, and – what did you accuse her of, hmm? – I bet you said she didn’t even care, didn’t love you! When you’re as much to her as the air she breathes! You fucking ass, Quinn!"

Quinn stared at her, his teeth clenched as his thoughts swirled frantically. Without even thinking, he tried reaching out to her even in his mind, tried touching her. But he encountered a terrible blankness in his mind, a strong, mental barrier designed to keep him away. “Lusiel,” he breathed softly. He floundered, skittered back from the realization how much he had hurt her. Jaesa snorted at him, "Typical blindness. You all want us to fix your problems, then get all huffy when we use you right back. What will you do now, when she’s standing at the door ready to go out there and fight with nothing to hold onto?”

Quinn flinched, stumbling back and closing his eyes as he thought, remembered. She was crying, he thought madly. He left her there crying, left her by herself after she had begged him. Begged him! His own Lusiel, who already fought with everything she was to protect the ones she loved. How could he have been such a fool to forget that? Even for a moment, to forget how fiercely she protected the ones she loved! Her brother, her little twi’lek friend, her apprentice – but especially _him_. How could he have imagined she wouldn’t protect him with every bit of her most fervent effort, with every drop of her blood if needed? Quinn had never known a stronger, more defending warrior … Never!

And he had lashed against her misunderstanding, struck at her most tender feelings when she needed him more than anything. She needed him to tell her she was wrong, that she wasn’t failed. But he’d only whipped her like she was some annoying puppy undeserving of so much better. Verbally flayed her! She likely didn’t even understand what drove him to it, didn’t realize he didn’t know! The thought of her believing that she was so flawed … Quinn felt the prick of tears against the back of his closed eyes, squeezed them even tighter. He had punished Lusiel brutally – for trying to protect him.

Vette was looking around at each of them, one by one. "I don't know what to say."

Pierce heaved a sigh as he propped his chin down onto the palm of his hand, "We have to get to this sorry point in order to shut you up?" Vette glared him, "Jerk."

Lord Qet suddenly appeared in the doorway. "It's time. Darth Vowrawn and Lord Lusiel are prepared to leave. They're waiting for you at the entrance, captain." Quinn spun, began wildly tossing items into his pack without any care or concern for their organization. He slung the pack haphazardly over his shoulder. Vette exhaled roughly, "What're you going to do, Quinn?"

He looked at her. For the first time since she’d met him, Quinn looked like he just didn’t know. Vette thought it was purely disconcerting to see him like that. He finally murmured desperately, "I have to _talk_ to her."

Jaesa snorted, "Didn’t you already do that? Seems your talking to her’s already done plenty of damage, actually."

Quinn ignored her, although his eyes were dark blue with pained regret. He rushed from the kitchen, his pack bouncing against his side. He strapped it into place as he moved, saw the group gathered in front of the entrance. Vowrawn was facing him and waved when he saw him approaching, crooning, "Ah, captain. We were just waiting for you." Lusiel's back was to him, and she stiffened when Vowrawn called him. She pointedly did not look at him, when she normally watched for his every motion when they were in the same room together.

Quinn stepped closer to her, trying to get her to look at him. "My lord. We should speak together for a moment." He wanted to touch her, should have held her, comforted her! Instead, all he could see in his mind was the look on her face when he demanded she order him. That hurt on her face, in her eyes! He forced himself to breathe, biting back a moan of distress.

"There's no time for that, captain. We've waited as long as we could, actually," Lusiel turned, looking at Vowrawn. "We'll get through whatever defenses Baras has in place. Once we're inside the chamber, we'll call for you to join us, Darth Vowrawn."

"Of course. It’s a sound plan. I will wait for your call just outside the facility."

Lusiel nodded. She stepped towards the door, and Quinn actually stumbled as he followed her. She glanced at him, then. Her dark eyes were murky, swollen; shadowed. He could tell she had cried, even if her skin was dewy from bathing in fresh water. Quinn swallowed, reached for her hand. But she jerked back around and walked out of the door. Vowrawn called towards her back, "Let's send Baras our very best regards, shall we?"

_____________________________________

Lusiel stood in front of the figure, frowning. It was obviously a female; it quivered and shook in the midst of its imprisonment. Its dark energy was awesome, washing down over her in a steady drone of power and thrilling menace. There was so much thrilling anger in the thing, so much rage! It mirrored the discontent Lusiel herself was feeling, and she almost wanted to cheer at the entity, “Oh, I get you! I really do! Right now, you and me? We could be sisters!”

That was just enough, apparently. The exultation of the Entity was obvious the closer to it she moved. It practically cackled with glee as Lusiel stopped right in front of the pool where the thing was trapped. "You come to destroy the defiler! Yes! Destroy him!”

Darth Vowrawn gazed up at her, awed. "Isn't she beautiful? Such dark energy, such perfection!"

Lusiel lifted her shoulder, "I do believe she’s fairly _angry_ at Baras. I can easily relate." Vowrawn chuckled, turning his head sideways to glance at her. On her other side, Quinn used several instruments to monitor the field holding the Entity in place. Lusiel inclined her chin as she addressed her, “I hate him, too. I always have.”

"Free me! Now! Free me, hurry!" The Entity shook and trembled still more, becoming agitated. Vowrawn held out his hands, "No, we’ll free you! I know the incantation. Your torment is ended." He approached the force-powered cell the Entity was trapped inside of, his dark purplish hands held up as he prepared the ritual. But the Entity sang out a warning sound again.

"You are too late. His servant approaches."

Lusiel felt him, then. She stiffened, spinning around to face the man coming into the chamber from behind them.

Draahg lashed out quickly, sending Vowrawn flying into a nearby wall, before trapping him into a painful death field. Lusiel yelled, "No! Vowrawn!" She should have remembered the bastard could do that! How much failure could one warrior endure in a course of days? She yanked at her lightsaber, felt its power coming to life as she sneered at Draahg all over again. His scars, his torn visage, the nasty cybernetic eyes that shined at her in metallic horror.

Quinn shifted, moving off and away from the impending battle, his blaster held up and ready. Lusiel nodded as she felt him, heard his distress calling to her through the bond again, beating futilely against the walls she had put between them. He still lacked the ability to reach her, didn’t seem to know how, even. So she just ruthlessly ignored him the entire way through the defenses of this place.

Only now did she let him hear her, lowering her resistance enough to direct him, " _Stay back, don't let him close to you_." She commanded him, because he said he would listen to that much.

" _Lusiel! Wait! I …_ "

She shook her head sharply, blocking him again. Quinn groaned aloud, but he slid sideways from the reach of her lightsaber. Draahg laughed as he glanced at the Imperial, "You didn't get the chance to see me beat his face the last time we met. This time, I'll take his head right in front of you!”

Lusiel sneered, “I beat you when you were in one piece, Draahg. Not sure what you think will change this time.”

"I told you, I can't die! What more proof do you need? I stand here, even after you burned me alive!"

She shrugged. "Indeed. You truly are a glutton for punishment, coming back to fail yet again. How delightful."

"Pain sustains me, actually. I relished it when you watched me burn. Drank of it as Baras rebuilt me," he said, smoothing his fingers across his metallic implants, his scarred flesh. The motion was sensual, erotic.

Lusiel frowned at him, obviously repelled and disgusted, "No need to rub yourself. I do get the point."

Draahg lowered his chin, as if to see straight into her eyes. "Oh, you would have enjoyed belonging to me. I would have taught you such incredible pleasures, how to savor the fullest measure of pain." He looked at Quinn, saw his anger and his revulsion, his blaster held up in readiness, "There's still a chance, mind you. All we would need to do is remove one single obstacle."

She chuckled, "I told you before, Draahg. You will never measure up to my own Quinn. Stop trying. It's pitiful, really."

"Fool woman! Now I'll only delight in your destruction. Yours, and Vowrawn's, of course. He has mere minutes left to live." Draahg laughed in sad, pathetic machine-like tones, "You chased your vengeance all this way, only to be run down by mine!"

Quinn yelled when Draahg suddenly lifted Lusiel, sent her flying solidly into a nearby wall. Lusiel used the force to stop herself from hitting too hard. But she still impacted the rocky surface with hard, painful power. Quinn heard her yelp, saw her spin a hard glance at Draahg even as blood ran down along the side of her face. How hard did her head hit the wall, he wondered wildly.

Then her hand whipped out, pushing back against the other Sith and propelling _him_ through the air rather. Draahg wasn't as prepared as she was. He hit a pillar opposite from Lusiel hard enough to fill the chamber with a terrible and mighty boom of sound. The Entity cried out a happy sound, "Yes, kill him! His machinery powers the death field! Free me!"

Lusiel certainly didn’t wait for the Entity’s encouragement. She was already leaping towards her enemy. Draahg met her oncoming blow with his own red lightsaber, their blades shrilling sharply against each other in terrible cadence. They lashed at each other, with Draahg shouting repeated threats, swearing he'd decimate her, rip her limbs from her body, break her. Lusiel only laughed, meeting his attacks with steady resolve and pressing him back against every bashing stroke that he made with his weapon. Draahg screamed a raging sound, insanely rushing at her. Except Lusiel stood firmly and swiped against his knee just as he came within reach, forcing him to jump back.

That's when Quinn caught his eye again. The Imperial was frantically treating Vowrawn with a medical droid, keeping the Darth alive even through the power of Draahg's death field. Draahg growled at him, throwing a hard push with the force towards the captain. Quinn cried out as his body was driven through the air. He looked up, watched the wall coming towards his head, frantically tried shooting his blaster at Draahg even as he flew by.

Then he felt that presence in his mind, that part of his mind he knew now was really Lusiel, heard her crying out, " _No, not him, catch him_ ". He felt – _felt_ – Lusiel's Force strength, felt that it stretched and reached out, felt it snap into form. He actually _saw_ it, the shimmering barrier that caught him as if in a net. He felt himself stop moving, so suddenly in the middle of his forceful flight that his jaw snapped shut hard enough his teeth cut into the tender part of his lower lip and blood welled in his mouth. He heard Lusiel crying out, looked over to see she was watching him, and her voice trilled through his consciousness, " _Yes!_ " Then Draahg yelled at her, "So busy saving him, you forget yourself!" He leaped at her and she twisted to meet his attack.

Quinn wiggled against the force-hold that kept him thrust up into the air, trying to break loose. He was abruptly released, almost like a wrenching jerk, and he dropped roughly down onto the floor without any sort of grace. He grunted as he spit blood out onto the floor. He heard a strange sound come from Lusiel, glanced over at her. She was facing Draahg, so her back was to him. They stood frozen there, and Quinn frowned. What was happening? He struggled back to his feet.

Draahg laughed. Lusiel sneered at him, refusing to look down towards her abdomen where just the barest tip of Draahg's lightsaber pierced her, "Is that all you have, you worthless piece of trash?"

"I knew you wanted me thrusting inside of you," Draahg chuckled.

But Lusiel only rolled her eyes.

Draahg looked over her shoulder, watching Quinn. He smirked down at her. "What do you think it would do to him, if I was to tear you apart right in front of him? That kind of pain might be delicious. I'd savor it."

"You're a fool, Draahg. You know that, don't you? You should've pressed your advantage while you still had it," Lusiel shook her head.

Then she raised a booted foot and sent it flying with smooth and painful intensity into Draahg's groin. Standing so close, she was able to hit him quite forcefully just underneath his protective padding, nailing him squarely in the scrotum. Draahg actually squealed, rearing back away from her and yanking his lightsaber free of its initial penetration.

Lusiel felt a gush of blood under her skin and knew abruptly the greatest damage was all inside. Whatever his weapon had torn, there was little outward sign of it. If she didn't finish this soon, the wound would prove mortal as she bled out.

That's why she didn't hesitate. Even as Draahg fell back onto the ground, Lusiel was already jumping. She landed on his head, each one of her booted feet on either side of his face. He glared up at her, groaning as he still cupped his pained groin with both hands. Lusiel shouted, raising her foot so she could smash her boot into his nose. Draahg shrieked again, wetly now since blood was running down into his mouth. She didn't hesitate, though. She stomped his face again. Then again. She didn't stop stomping, not until his face was a messy pulp of blood and bone and her boot was soaked red.

Lusiel reeled suddenly, gasping as pain ripped through her lower stomach. She heard Darth Vowrawn fell over onto his knees, released suddenly from the death field that Draahg had compelled around him. The Entity crowed in terrible triumph, her voice singing out over the entire chamber. "And the Defiler saw it all! Such _glorious_ effort!"

"My lord!" Quinn finally reached Lusiel, reaching out to grasp her elbow. She pulled away from him, though, trying to see Vowrawn. She couldn't allow the Darth to see such damage and come to believe her incapable of defeating Baras. She needed his support.

Besides, she thought. Quinn hated her now. She couldn't stand for him to touch her when he hated her so much. But she ached so badly, wanted to cry some more and refused to. She bit her lip as she looked down at the floor and her mental barriers wavered. Especially with him standing so warm and close to her just then, his blue eyes running up and down her frame quickly. That’s the only reason he heard her tired, sad little whisper in his mind just then, heard her, “ _Don’t hate me anymore … it hurts_.”

Quinn jerked, staring at her in shocked dismay. He was startled enough he didn't notice she winced in real pain as she turned to face Vowrawn. Instead, he whispered her name, reached for her. But Lusiel staggered past him towards the Darth. Quinn practically stumbled in his haste to follow her.

Darth Vowrawn was almost dancing, as if his earlier ordeal had never happened. "Such an intense finish! I thought surely I would die. I've never felt pain like that! You provide such wonderful entertainment, Wrath!"

She quirked an eyebrow at him. "Just wait until I defeat Baras."

"Oh, what a thought. But let's enjoy this thoroughly, first." Vowrawn chuckled as he turned to face the Entity again. "Baras must be twisting with fury right now. How wonderful."

Even Lusiel smiled, and nevermind the pain that persisted in her stomach. She watched as Vowrawn made his ritual motions only barely. Rather, she subtly touched against her wounded stomach, felt the hardening lump there where the blood was pooling. Behind her, Quinn shifted. He was increasingly uneasy as Lusiel's own distress mounted. She panted softly as she threw up more mental barriers to keep him unaware of her pain just a little while longer, long enough for Vowrawn to finish so they could all leave.

That's when Vowrawn began crying out excitedly. "The final gate is lifted. You are free, Entity!" Lusiel watched as the Entity suddenly appeared directly in front of them in a shower of blood and shadow. The female figure regarded them, its sense of triumph and freedom palpable. "I am free! And grateful! Remember me, young one, to the Defiler." Lusiel bowed her head, felt Quinn lowering himself in respectful obeisance behind her. Then the Entity was … just gone. Lusiel blinked as she looked around.

Vowrawn was elated. "You have been a revelation, Wrath! I have rarely met a more remarkable Sith. There is no better time for you to take on Baras. Give me some days. And the Dark Council will be prepared. I will usher you in, then." Lusiel nodded towards him, watched as Vowrawn proceeded her from the Chamber. She was quite proud of herself. She only stumbled one time as she followed him out of the door.

_____________________________________

Quinn followed Lusiel into the lounge of the Wing, grateful to be back in the familiar space again. Jaesa was perched on the edge of the lounge seat, watching them with hard eyes that glittered as cold as golden coins from some ancient civilization. Pierce was leaning against the wall next to her, his boot placed squarely on the edge of Jaesa’s robe on the floor. Apparently, he was striving to keep things from becoming overtly violent.

Quinn sighed. He mumbled towards Lusiel, "My lord. We must speak. Now."

Vette blustered, like a blue thunderstorm. "You didn't talk to her yet? Are you joking?"

He glared at the twi'lek, opened his mouth to chastise her. But he suddenly noticed Lusiel swaying as she stood still in front of him. He frowned. "My lord?" He reached for her but she turned around slowly to face him. Her face was completely white so that her eyes looked huge and lost in her face, almost black and glassy. Sweat was beading her forehead and she was in obvious and terrible pain. He murmured, asking her what was wrong.

She stared at him. Then she whispered to him. She said, "Malavai … catch me."

"Lusiel! Gods, no!"

He actually sounded worried, she thought. Everything went away.


	113. Into the Kolto Tank

Vette crept silently into the medical bay, holding a plate with several pieces of endwa, a popular Corellian dish with fried meat slathered in an orange and sweet gravy. Quinn didn't look at her as she entered, even though she knew he was aware of her. He only sighed as he reached up and pinched the bridge of his nose again, rubbing his face tiredly.

She glanced around the bay as she settled the plate on one of the bare surfaces. The room was dark and quiet, with the only light coming from the kolto tank spilling across the floor and the only sound the beeping of the tank's instrumentation. Quinn was seated in a chair he'd collapsed into shortly after he settled Lusiel into the tank. He'd been sitting there ever since, for hours now, ignoring the rest of them unless they asked about her welfare. Then he'd say she was fine and would be well, before going right back to watching her silently.

"You should eat, Quinn." Vette said to him, finally. But he didn't move, except to shrug. So Vette took to pulling and yanking another chair into place aside Quinn's, settling into place next to him so she could stare up at Lusiel, as well.

The Sith floated unconscious, with a large tube jutting into her mouth. Her hair had been loosely tied back but some tendrils floated free to spread out and around her head, waving in the kolto liquid bath like some kind of strange sea plant. The rest of her body was covered in a loose shift that had become translucent in the liquid, but her arms were clasping her frame, even in her unconscious state, so it was nearly impossible to really see her entire body.

"She doesn't look overly dangerous when she's floating in there. She looks so pretty, and soft." Vette chuckled as she nodded towards the tank. Quinn remained still for a moment, then he glanced at Vette.

"She's pregnant."

Vette gasped, regarded him with a shocked and uneasy expression. "Are you serious? But how …?"

Quinn raised an eyebrow at the twi'lek.

"Okay, never mind _how_. I only meant … well, she was stabbed in the stomach, wasn't she?"

"In the liver, yes. Her uterus wasn't disrupted at all. The fact the child is still so new helped. She's too small to have been effected."

"She?"

Quinn spoke softly in a pleased tone, "Lusiel dreamed of our daughter weeks ago. We knew it would happen soon."

Vette shook her head, slightly awed. "Wow. Well. Maybe you should've been more careful."

He shrugged, "We both wanted it so much, there seemed no point in preventing it."

"No point? Uh … there's a scary-assed Darth trying to kill us all!"

Quinn's eyes went dark with menace all of a sudden. "Baras won't be a matter of concern for much longer. Darth Vowrawn assured us the Council will convene in mere days. Lusiel will confront Baras, then."

Vette stared at him, "But if she's pregnant, should she be fighting?"

She saw him wince and wanted to cry all of a sudden. It occurred to her Quinn wanted nothing more than to wrap Lusiel into some sort of soft cotton wrap, protect her utterly, spirit her away where no one could find her, let alone strike at her. Instead, he was going to be forced to watch as his pregnant wife fought for her life in front of the entire Dark Council. Shit, it was tough to love a Sith, she thought, suddenly hoping she herself was never that dumb.

"Well, hell," Vette muttered as she looked up at Lusiel, still floating silently in her kolto bath. She'd been that dumb ages ago, she realized. Cause she'd really hate it if she lost Lusiel now. Lusiel was the greatest friend she'd ever had, better even than Risha, perhaps. She looked back at Quinn. "So what's the plan, then? Cause I know you have one. I doubt you go to the refresher without a plan, Quinn."

He sighed, refused to rise to her baiting. He just watched Lusiel, thoughtful. "We focus on the most pressing threats for now, Vette. I have to repair the damage that's been done to Lusiel. She must be strong enough to face Baras and defeat him."

Vette eyed him, knew he wasn't talking about the puncture wound to her stomach that kept her confined to a kolto tank for the next few hours at least. "So … uh … can you actually hear her thoughts right now?"

"No. She's well able to block me when she wants to. She hasn't really allowed me that close to her since I hurt her." Quinn looked away from the tank, then. "She thinks I hate her."

Vette bit her lip to keep from laughing at the bewildered tone Quinn used. He looked at her, sharply. She shrugged back at him. "What? It's funny you can't imagine she'd jump to the most extreme possibility where you're concerned. It's not like you've ever really been angry with her before. And, heck, she's only a year older than me! Women, especially when we're young, tend to be creatures of extremes."

He shook his head. "I should have made her listen to me."

"Yea, I can see how that would've worked out so wonderfully. Not that we have enough space in the kolto tank, either." Vette chuckled. Quinn shot her a dark look. "Whatever. Fact remains what you should've done and actually did are two different things. Stop worrying about the crap you can't change, though."

Quinn sighed. Vette got up and trundled her chair back to its regular location. Then she plunked the plate of food down onto Quinn's lap. "Eat, captain. You're going to need it." Vette eyed him carefully. "I'm trying to imagine you as a father. You know what? I think you'll actually be pretty good at it."

He shook his head. "At least one of us does."

"Bah! What's to worry about? A kid with your smarts and Lusiel's power couldn't possibly cause any enormous problems." She laughed when Quinn went white. She actually skipped out of the medical bay.


	114. Let me Tell you, Listen to Me

Lusiel emerged from her bath holding a bright red drying cloth around her small frame as her hair dripped steadily down her backside, to find Quinn sitting calmly at the foot of the bed, watching her. He was dressed only casually, in only a pale white shirt and black pants. His feet were bare, even.

She sighed. He couldn't wait until she was dried and dressed, she thought. Just great. Well, at least she managed several blissful moments in a real, hot bath. It was one of the first upgrades she made to the Wing, in fact.

Lusiel looked around. When she'd sensed Quinn coming into their quarters, she thought he would be gathering together his things and leaving, the better to avoid her. But his uniforms remained tucked in the closet and his datapad and commlink had been placed carefully in the plate on top of the dresser where he normally stored them. She was confused.

"Come here, Lusiel," Quinn crooked a finger towards her, gesturing for her to approach him. Lusiel stiffened, holding the cloth tighter around herself. She lifted her chin proudly, "You say that like I'll actually obey you."

"It certainly would make this far simpler," he responded.

"You're _not_ my master."

"That would make for an interesting game, though, you have to admit."

She looked at him as if he had suddenly gone crazy, her expression so stunned he actually chuckled. She huffed, striding over to the wardrobe in search of clothes she could use to cover herself. But Quinn climbed to his feet and started approaching her. Lusiel froze, watching him with suddenly wide eyes and holding that cloth like it was a Force barrier against him. And Quinn stopped, frowning at her.

"What is it, Lusiel? What's wrong?"

"You … I don't want you to _fuck_ me." She sneered at the ending, her nose curled up in effected disgust. She tried to sound angry and strong, the way a Sith was supposed to sound. But her eyes were dull, dark with pain. She was actually terrified to be touched like that, without feeling or care. She had never coerced someone into pleasuring her, never! Like being held down and made to do it, even. Only the notion sickened her. She muttered, "Just … don't."

Quinn clenched his eyes closed, trying to hide from the evidence of the pain he'd caused her. He sighed, breathing roughly for several moments. Then he looked at her, utterly serious and firm as he told her, assured her, "I have never _fucked_ you. Not even once. Every time I've touched you, that was me, loving you. If you let me touch you now, it will still be me, loving you." He sighed, "Lusiel, you could kill me, and I'd _die_ \- loving you."

Lusiel looked away from him, stared at the wall across from where they stood, ignoring him. He stretched out a hand, laid it against her shoulder, softly. She sighed, then, as she felt his fingers running down her arm so until he grasped her fingers in between his own. "Now, come here, Lusiel." He pulled her and she let him, numbly following him towards the bed.

He settled down against the foot of the bed, reaching for the cloth she was still clutching against herself. He grunted, moved her fingers aside, then grasped the cloth and moved it away, baring her to his gaze and murmuring, “Gods, you’re beautiful.” Lusiel whimpered. Then she caught her lip between her teeth, biting herself to keep from making any noise. She glared at him, "I wish you would just say it aloud. Just say you don’t want this anymore, that you hate me. I refuse to be dragged along through this … farce!"

He shrugged, "I have no idea how to hate you, actually. I used to try not to like you. Wasn't able to accomplish even that much."

"You tried not to like me? What did you do, write up a plan?"

"You didn't notice?" Quinn rolled his eyes, "I thought your flirting was only a game, that you only wanted to affect my feelings, to entice me. A Sith youngling playing at being grown, basically.” He sighed, saw his breath brush across her nipple until it puckered. The corner of his mouth turned up only slightly, “I just didn't believe you could actually _want_ me, at least not more than as a minor diversion. I can hardly compare to a true Sith, someone of power and ability."

She pouted, "Well. It _was_ a game. And why not?"

"Oh. So then. Did I win?"

Lusiel just looked at him. He was smiling at her once again, his eyes alight with pleasure as she watched him. She ran her gaze across his face and brow, down over his features, to consider his frame, his arms and hands that were slowly smoothing the red cloth across and over her skin, drying her, and his legs that were spread wide so that he could pull her body in between his knees, tucking her against him until her thighs were pressed up into the cradle of his own warm groin. She reached up to place her hands on his shoulders, clenched her fingers against them. She watched him shut his eyes, savoring the feel of her hands on him, that she was reaching out to him. Then they opened once again so that he could see her.

She smiled as she looked into his eyes, "Are you asking me if I lost?"

"Did you?"

She frowned, her eyes suddenly darkening. "I thought I did, yes."

"Hmmm. And when was this? When did you think you'd lost me, Lusiel?"

She looked away. But he fingered her chin, turning her back to face him again. She sighed, "You make me feel like I'm not a Sith."

He smiled, "You would be amazed how often I have to remember that you’re Sith. I find it so easy to think of you as Lusiel. Just Lusiel," Quinn reached his arms around her, running his hands down to cup her back side and gripped her harder against him. "To me, you're just a woman, just this perfect woman I want every time I breathe."

Lusiel groaned.

"Answer the question, Lusiel."

She pressed her lips together, "You know when."

He shook his head, "I was angry. And it wasn’t warranted, either."

"You hated me!"

"No. Gods, no. Never. Lusiel, sometimes I'll be angry. But I'll _never_ hate you."

She swallowed, "I failed you."

"You didn’t."

"But…"

"Lusiel, we could bandy this back and forth as if we were playing some kind of Pong game. Are we really going to spend the next few hours like that? I can think of several things I'd rather do." Quinn blew another breath across Lusiel’s chest, watching her breasts pucker into brilliant hard nubs.

She licked her lips slowly, "Only several?"

He hummed. His eyes slowly turned that unique shade of black-blue that she adored so much. "Quite a few, actually." She pushed against his shoulders until he leaned back to incline against the bed and watch as she climbed into his lap, straddling his thighs so that her warm center pressed up against his belly. He hissed up at her, then murmured soothingly when she whimpered.

"Are you going to let me in again? I was only getting used to hearing you in my head, after all, and then you shut me out." Quinn rocked himself against her, so that her breasts rubbed up against his chest. He groaned when she ran her hands up to tangle them into the hair at the back of his head, holding onto him as she canted her hips against his own.

"I thought you didn't want me there."

"And now you know the truth."

She leaned down to look him in the eyes. She truly enjoyed the feeling of connection that she shared with him, mourned and feared when she thought she needed to shut him apart from her. That her presence in his mind offended him, maybe. Hearing different was the sweetest balm, "Really?"

"Yes. Really. Now, Lusiel. Let me feel you again. Please." He begged her, moaning when he sensed her fleeting touches along his mental paths. Felt her soft touches against his mind and finally, finally heard her whispering his name there all over again, heard, " _Malavai_." Like a sigh against his very self. "Ah, Lusiel. You have no idea how much peace you gave me when I needed it most. When Baras had his claws embedded in me. Touching you, feeling you touch me – it was everything comforting."

"I'll make him pay, Malavai. I'll destroy him."

He opened his eyes, regarded her solemnly, "Yes. And I'll watch you do it. I’ll be there next to you, with our daughter all nestled inside you … It will be so incredible, knowing there’s something of me there, something I made that’s a part of you." He felt even harder as he pressed against her, groaned heavily as he rocked him even more firmly.

"Malavai?" She was gasping, stunned.

He chuckled. "Usually the mother tells the father, you know. How comforting to know that even now we are utterly unique together." He gripped her around the hips, standing suddenly, holding her tucked against him, before spinning her around to lay her down on her back against the bed. He looked down at her as he began pulling his shirt over his head, yanked his pants loose and kicked them off. She was gaping down the length of her body, looking at her soft, still flat belly and clutching at it. Then she looked at him, worried suddenly.

"Is she … okay? Draahg stabbed me!"

He stepped closer to the bed, until his knees bumped against the cushion. Then he leaned over to press his lips against her stomach, kissed the spot that only barely showed a thin, red line now. The last evidence of her wounding against Draahg's lightsaber. "I'm rather glad you didn't see me when I first detected her, there, trying to determine where and how you were wounded. I was … frightened. But, no, Lusiel. She's fine." He looked back up at her, his eyes deadly serious, "I'll kill anyone who tries to change that."

She ran her fingers along his brow. "We'll protect her together."

"Starting with Baras."

"Yes. Does anyone else know?"

He nuzzled her stomach, edging down towards the vee between her legs. "Vette."

"Oh. That's fine, then." Lusiel sighed. "Oh, yes. Like that. Just there." She tossed her head back and forth against the bed as he licked against her clit. She began to whine in agitated pleasure as he suckled her, wiggled her clit against his tongue, then dipped down to kiss and lick her slit, too. He moaned into her sex and the vibration sent a spattering of intense sensation through her, so that she arched her back, pushing herself against his mouth.

She continued moaning. "We'll have to come up with plans. Ways to keep her safe … Oh. Yes." He rubbed his cheek against her inner thigh, then returned to his feast of her sex, savoring the taste of her. "Did I tell you … about Gratham? I didn't, I know I didn't. I should have."

"Who is he?"

"Sith. Ahhh. I killed his son. Years ago. Oh. Hunter told me … Gratham has a bounty on my … yes! On my firstborn."

Quinn softly loosened his lips from around her clit, leaning back to look up at her. He came to his knees, crouching between her spread legs. "I'm already preparing careful plans to ensure that you're both safe. Now. I want to be inside of you. I want you to put me there." His eyes were gleaming darkly at her. Lusiel thrilled. She reached out for him, grasped his erection and rubbed him smoothly for several long moments, listened as he gasped and hissed, watched his eyes become darker and darker with his lust.

"Lusiel. Do it. Now."

"I'll come soon."

"Not until I'm inside. I want to feel it."

"What does it feel like?"

He closed his eyes, rocked his hips into her pumping fingers, groaned. "It feels … like coming home. Do it, Lusiel!"

She whimpered as she pressed the tip of him against her slit, rubbed him there. He moaned, looked down to watch her - watch her small, pale hand wrapped around his flesh, watch as the head of his erection slipped just inside, watch the way the sweet, dewy lips of her sex parted and stretched around him as he began to slide all the way into her.

Quinn reached under her rear, grasping her cheeks so that he could raise her hips higher against him as he began to thrust into her. It took only three strokes of his cock against her inner muscles, just three taps against her sweet little cervix, before he felt her orgasm washing against his hardness. Her liquid release coated her sex and his inner thighs, especially as he continued thrusting, groaning heatedly into silence of the room.

"So fast, Lusiel."

"Feels so good."

"Let me feel it again."

He thrust harder against her, faster. She watched him, sighing, keening every so often. But she never stopped watching him. His eyes were as dark as midnight, with mere slivers of blue around the pupils, and they gleamed down at her. He pushed himself into her as deep and hard as he could possibly go, again and again, and his gaze smoldered with the power of his feelings. She could feel how strongly he felt, almost as strong as his body felt moving over her, into her.

So she called to him, wailed his name across their bond. She exulted in the intensity of his emotions, the power of his feelings, and let the compelling fervency of the sensations lift and carry her into another orgasm. She felt it burst upon her, cried aloud to the open room, screamed his name. He answered her, pushing inside, thrusting hard before he suddenly stopped with his cock butted right up against her soft cervical center. And he came, his orgasm surging and breaking against the soft tissues inside of her.

" _Lusiel! Yes, gods! I love you so much!_ "

She laughed in delight as his voice sounded in her head, reaching up to hold him as he collapsed down upon her, breathing madly. She held him against her, happily listening as his heartbeat slowed and his breathing eased. Until he finally softened and rolled off her to lay next to her. He yanked her up against himself, though, refusing to let her move too far away. Where he couldn't touch her..

She smiled into the darkening room. "We should have discussions like this more often."

"Every day." It sounded like he was making her a promise.

"I'd like that."

"Of course. Whatever you need."


	115. Finding the Center

The red dust of Korriban was swirling madly in the air as the shuttle touched down at the landing pad. Quinn followed his lord respectfully down the ramp of the shuttle. He stepped closer as the storm's winds whipped around them suddenly, blocking the natural force as much as possible as Lusiel proceeded towards the doors of the Sith Academy.

He eyed the group gathered there carefully, gauging them for risk to Lusiel's safety. He disregarded the red-robed guards, especially as they came to deferential attention when Lusiel stepped inside the doorway. But the other two men were a different matter.

"Lord Rathari. It's been a long time since we last met." Lusiel nodded towards the Sith, watched as he bowed slightly in return.

"The day has finally arrived, Lord Lusiel. I will stand with you, to witness your battle with Darth Baras. As it should be. My presence will assure the Council you have Sith support." Then he smiled, grimly. "And I get to hear Baras scream."

Tremel couldn't hold back his curiosity any further. He'd been eyeing Quinn hard enough to make the Imperial purely uncomfortable. "You must be Captain Quinn. I'm rather glad we're finally meeting." He looked at Lusiel. "Now you won't have to stash your armor whenever we meet, hmm?"

"Hopefully it means I don't have to travel to Nar Shaddaa as much anymore, old man. Ever again, if I can help it." Lusiel shook her head, then she held out a hand to touch Quinn's elbow, soothed his confusion through their bond. " _My old teacher, the one who’s hand I gave to Baras. My friend.._ "

Tremel eyed them both carefully, noted the way Quinn's frown smoothed out after a moment's pause. "Fascinating to watch it." Quinn shot him a pointed look, but Tremel raised a hand. "Please. It's bad enough _she_ still shoots me dirty looks for bidding her to do it without warning of the risk to your life. Don't you start, too."

"I always follow my lord's direction." Quinn retorted in the calm, even tone so common to Imperials.

Tremel shot a glare towards Lusiel. "You told him to say that."

"There was no need. He's only being honest," Lusiel shrugged, so that Tremel shook his head in exasperation.

Rathari glanced at Quinn, considering. "It should perhaps be better served if your apprentice was in attendance, Lord Lusiel. It would be a greater show of Sith strength, I would think."

Lusiel replied with sharpness. "No. Darth Baras will see Quinn with me and he'll know I beat him, even before the fight commences. He tried so hard to deny me the prize, after all. Besides." She shrugged, glancing around at the still silent and ever-present guards. "It's just as important that they know I have solid Imperial support, as well."

Tremel hummed approvingly as the guards stiffened proudly into attention. "You've always been unusual a Sith when it came to our soldiers. Not surprising, perhaps. The daughter of an Imperial hero, who's gone on to wed an Imperial officer herself." He glanced at Rathari, "The Council has already considered your alliances in that regard, noted your attentions and loyalties, of course. It's hardly worth hiding at this point."

Lusiel shrugged. "I've never thought it should be hidden. Our soldiers serve us faithfully. Their commitment and duty should be recognized." She noted the solid esteem that marked the stance of their guards, then, as their group began moving towards the Council chamber.

Darth Vowrawn met them in the antechamber outside the room where the Council had gathered. Quinn stepped closer to her as they both considered the rumbling sound of Darth Baras' voice coming from behind the closed doors.

"Ah, you're here! Anticipation fills my veins with fire! I feel a hundred years younger!" He leaned closer. "Darth Baras hasn't shut up since the earliest hours this morning. I can not wait to see the look on his face when I introduce you to the Council."

Lusiel waved a hand. "You should have a holocam ready. Preserve the moment for posterity."

Vowrawn laughed. "Ha! If only we could sell tickets! I really do like you, Wrath. I'm not sure I've had this much fun in as many years." He looked around at the rest of the group, chuckled. "Each one of your adherents, here, is one who's been targeted and abused by Darth Baras himself. He'll make note of it, mind you."

"So long as he notes I've _always_ despised him and long planned his destruction." Lusiel crossed her arms across her chest as she nodded towards the Darth, "I’ve won already. All that's left is to bury him for good."

"You are perfection! I almost wish I was younger and you were not already married." Vowrawn eyed Quinn carefully. "Alas. I can only admire you from afar. I suppose, we should bring my quite fashionable tardiness to a close."

Lusiel sighed, feeling the exhilaration thrill through her. " _At last! It's time!_ " She sang through her bond with Quinn and felt his response, the gladness that it would finally be over. That, and the caution, too. So much was riding on this fight. So much to gain but so much to lose, too. She breathed in and out, focusing herself. She admitted it to Vowrawn, "I have never felt more alive, my lord."

Vowrawn smiled at her, "Lead the way, then."

They fell into step behind her as she approached the door. The red-robed guards at the doorway bowed low at her approach, sinking down to a knee as their heads lowered. Even Darth Vowrawn was caught by surprise. He sighed to Tremel, "It's her beautiful face, it must be." But Lusiel only regarded the men in their deferential pose, silent and firm. Then she stepped between them, striding through the door to confront her enemy.

Darth Baras was situated in the very center of the chamber, in the middle of the circle composed of the large stone seats cut throne-like all around him. Tremendous pillars towered up and over the Council circle, draped with flowing flags emblazoned with the Emperor's mark. The Council itself was gathered together, with many of the seats occupied, some via holo. Baras quieted as they entered, standing silently with his back to them, apparently listening to the stride of their various boots moving into the room.

Quinn grunted softly as he halted just inside and to the right of the doorway, as Tremel and Rathari moved to the left. The three men stood respectfully, quiet and firm in their allegiance to Lusiel's effort. Lusiel herself continued striding ahead, moving steadily, with Darth Vowrawn just behind her to demonstrate his support of her. She strode confidently forward until she was standing just behind her old master. Close enough to spit on him if she chose.

Baras boomed aloud then, "That had better be Darth Vowrawn coming through those doors."

Lusiel sneered at his back, "Don't pretend you were not expecting me, Baras. You and I know each other better than that." Above them both, the looming figure of a Sith Lord moved against his seat. Then he bent forward, until Lusiel could see the dull sheen of red paint on his mask.

She knew him!

Darth Marr leaned his shoulders back against the cushioned stone of his seat again, his thunderous voice resonating in the air as he intoned slowly, "An interesting development, Baras." Lusiel shot Marr another brief glance, at his large-framed body with tough muscles all encased in a hard shell of red and black armored plates. The Lord charged with the defense of the Empire … That’s all he could be right then, to her. This was her fight, her battle to make. She had to show them all!

The younger figure of Darth Ravage waved one of his hands just then, frowning at Vowrawn. "This isn't the time for one of your games, Vowrawn." Ravage was one of those who believed and supported Baras in his bid for the title of Voice, Vowrawn had told her. Not surprising, perhaps, for the Lord who ruled over Expansion and Diplomacy for the Empire. He would want the Emperor’s renewed Voice, if only to further his own efforts.

It was Marr who remained unconvinced, though. He seemed inclined to wait and watch the entire course play out, in fact. From what Vowrawn told her, Marr's intransience had proven purely frustrating for Baras, a fact which seemed to delight Vowrawn immensely. Marr had his reasons, Lusiel considered telling him. But she never proffered any of them.

Vowrawn advised Lusiel to sway Marr before anyone else. "Win Marr to your side, young Wrath, and the rest of the Council will follow you," Vowrawn had said. Lusiel knew Marr respected strength before anything else. So that’s what she would show him now.

That's why she stared Baras down, not looking anywhere else as she declared her own self, "I am the Emperor's Wrath. Chosen by the Supreme Master himself. I know His will. I know that Baras is not the Voice." She leaned forward, intent on Baras, "And I know the Emperor is displeased with this play Baras has foisted on you all."

Vowrawn retreated to his own seat, turning to face the rest of his fellows on the Council, "Listen to truth! You are the victims of a cruel and deceitful power grab. Baras has sought to usurp a place, to use us to achieve his own ends. He has reduced us down to mere gulls."

"Your desperation is obvious, Vowrawn. I can not imagine what reason compels you – greed or jealousy, perhaps. But you've refused to see reason!" Baras sneered towards Vowrawn, "The Dark Council is wise enough to see through your machinations, however. Because this … _child_ is not our Emperor's Wrath. She is merely your illusion!"

"Careful, Baras. Continue as you are and we'll come to think you envious of Lord Lusiel's youth, as much as her veracity!" Vowrawn chuckled.

Baras snorted. "Councilors, the Emperor will inform me what is to be done with Vowrawn. For now, assist me in destroying this rabble!"

Lusiel looked towards Darth Marr, and directed her words at him, particularly. "Baras seeks your assistance, because he knows I speak truly. He knows the Emperor would not have selected any Sith other than one of strength and will to be his Wrath." She glared at Baras, "He knows I can defeat him and his pathetic aspiration towards a status he is not fit for."

Baras almost spit at her in his anger. "Look at who she gathers around her, those who support her, to see why she can't be the Wrath! Overseer Tremel, a base coward who tried to undermine the purity of our training process …"

Lusiel interjected. "Who saw true strength and seized it when you would have ignored it."

Baras glared. "And Lord Rathari, who thumbed his nose at our traditions and got it bloodied like a disobedient dog."

"Who acted boldly and audaciously to further the aims of the Empire, rather than skulk around in shadows like you."

"And, of course, Captain Quinn. Can you even be sure he's loyal to you, child, and not me?"

She laughed outloud. "Why? Did you so enjoy toying with his mind after he flouted your briberies, Baras? A loyal Imperial officer you could not manage to convince except through a trick of the Force. It's your own petty maneuvers that show the true desperation, Baras." Lusiel pointed towards her husband, "I myself do not require such devices to secure a man's loyalty. I'm stronger than you."

Baras quivered angrily. Darth Ravage frowned as he watched them, tapping his fingers along the armrest of his chair, "The challenger is also supported by Darth Vowrawn, one of our own. Now, I have no doubt about you, Baras. But you must swat this gnat quickly, so that we may continue our business."

Darth Marr only grunted as he waited.

Lusiel squared herself, gathering her strength as Baras marched over to face her. " _Finally! I can kill him, at last! I can ruin and destroy him in front of them all!_ " But Baras was still rambling. "Fine. The master will grant the slave's last request. The Emperor calls for your death, Lusiel! Attack me if you dare!"

She sneered at him, "I was never, nor shall I ever be, your slave. And I'll show you now."

Lusiel flung out the force, catching Baras up and sending him flying. She leapt after him, flying at him with the crimson of her lightsaber peeling through the air. But he met her forcefully, tossing her away from him hard enough the air was beaten from her lungs when she hit the ground. Lusiel gasped as she looked up in time to see Baras leaping through the air at her, his robes twisting around him. She rolled to her feet rapidly, bringing her lightsaber up just in time to meet Baras' crushing attacks.

She danced around her old master, crooning her song, lifting her blade in brief flurrying jabs and prods against Baras' large frame. She toyed with him, enough he finally roared an awful shout at her, leaving her dazed while he lashed out with his lightsaber and struck against her soft shoulder. The pain jerked her back to awareness and she hissed, reaching out to punch Baras against the side of his head where his helmet was clasped shut. The chamber echoed with the clanking cry of her fist against the metal.

The Councilors shifted in their seats, intently watching the battle as it raged back and forth before them. The melody of the respective lightsabers resonated in the space, the clash and pull of their knelling blows ringing. But Baras tired quickly. Lusiel's motions were fiery in their precision, extraordinary in their exactitude. And she simply did not quit, pushing back against everything Baras brought to bear against her and standing strong even in the face of his growing anger.

Baras suddenly stopped, facing Lusiel as he panted tiredly. She eyed him bitterly, the red glow of her lightsaber highlighting her creamy features. Baras reached up to unclasp his helmet, letting it drop to the ground with a loud metallic clatter of sound. Lusiel frowned as she regarded his overly pale face, his bald pate gleaming white in the low light of the chamber. He began to laugh at her, then, just before his hands shot out and lightning – of all things, lightning! – came at her. She raised her lightsaber in time, watched as the energy of her blade crackled against the force of the purple lightning.

Baras whined, then. "Had enough? Child! Can you feel your grip on life slipping? Why do you persist in this futile gesture of vengeance? Was the blow against your lover that great, that you'd go to this length, to throw away your life even? Only let go, and I will grant you the peace of death."

She snarled back at him, her face lit up by the electrical static still sparking along her blade. "Peace is a lie, Baras. And you're the greatest liar I've ever known. Give up the bravado. No one's buying it."

Baras leaned back, dropping his hands. "Just being sporting. I would think you'd appreciate the chance to catch your breath." He looked towards Darth Vowrawn, "Your champion is failing, Vowrawn. And you'll be next."

Vowrawn laughed, pointedly regarding Lusiel's strong, determined stance. "Tell me, Baras. Is that coming from you or the Emperor? It's hard to tell the difference."

"Do not mock me!" He actually did spit this time, glaring at Lusiel. "Your patron just ensured that your suffering will be immense. Do you hear that, Quinn? It will be as I warned you! She'll be destroyed! She'll not die so easily today!"

That's when Lusiel felt the grip of the Force wrapping her in a choking hold. The blackness inked over and around her, holding her in place, freezing her. It settled across her entire form, enough that she felt her breaths coming low and hard as she fought to inhale through her growing panic. She felt grasped, controlled, and she could hear Baras laughing even as she struggled, alone. Baras was ranting, "I'll show them you're weak, prove you lack the ability to control anything, not even yourself! Once you lose yourself in the madness, I'll cut you down easily, simply!"

Then she felt him. Heard him. The bond leaped and snapped between them, his feelings of care, concern, protectiveness, and desire – all of it, in an instant, wholly hers. Her desperate call for help, he answered. With his presence, his anger, his hate. Quinn called to her, " _Kill him, Lusiel! Kill him now! Or I will!_ "

And Lusiel descended into the depths of the Force's rage, exhulted in it. Her eyes sparked crimson, her skin glowed with it. She writhed in its glory, cried out in its power. Only this time she wasn't alone. Quinn was there with her – and his own eyes gleamed with the darkest pools of red rage, his own skin sparked with the cerise glow of Lusiel's Force strength. He cried out, a wild masculine growl that filled the chamber. And Tremel yelled excitedly above it all, watching as the girl he'd taught and guided for so many years finally found her center, watching as she finally came into her power, "Yes, Lusiel! You have it! It's perfect, like I always said it would be!"

Baras leaped back, stunned. Lusiel eyed him in terrible raging splendor, like a wild predator eyeing a rodent it was intent on devouring. Her control was incredible, the strength of her rage overwhelming. The Councilors circling the chamber felt the awesome force of it, almost like they would gazing into the incredible energy of a burning star. They watched as she began to stalk Baras, watched as he stumbled back in a mad rush, turning to them to demand their help.

"You! All of you! You have to kill this fool, this upstart whelp! Now, the Emperor commands it!" He spun, facing Marr, moving away from Lusiel's intent approach. "Darth Marr, strike on the Emperor's behalf or suffer his disfavor!"

Darth Marr stared silently at the red glow suffusing Lord Lusiel, breathed in the power and breadth of her rage, her Force strength. Pride filled him, satisfaction thrummed in him. At last, he thought. Aloud, Marr intoned slowly, "I believe I'll take my chances with the Emperor's Wrath, Baras." The chamber rippled with the death knell of Baras' ambitions, echoing through the place like a bell that had been pealed. And one by one, the councilors nodded their agreement.

Baras roared. He twisted towards Ravage, glared at the Darth with desperation, "Ravage, have you taken leave of your sense, as well? Defend me! Defend the Voice!" Ravage shook his head, inclined his chin towards Lusiel, "No, I will not stand in the path of the Emperor's Wrath."

Lusiel growled, a rumbling noise that moved through the chamber and was echoed by her force bonded husband. Baras glared at them all, promising retribution, even as he turned around to look Lusiel in the eye once again. He decried her, "I can not die!" But Lusiel only glared, stepping close to him, "I told you … I’ll wash the galaxy clean of you, Baras."

She gripped the edge of Baras' armor, pulling him close enough she could whisper, "I hated you for so long. Now, I'm done." Baras glanced down when she placed the hilt of her lightsaber against his stomach. She heard him whimper. Then the song filled the air, the lightsaber trilling out its deadly tune, and Baras shrieked. Lusiel yanked her blade up, cutting him wide, before he finally fell backwards onto the floor in a soggy heap of blood and flesh.

Lusiel threw back her head, her arms held wide, her lightsaber aloft, crying out to the ceiling and air and all the Sith in the room of her victory, so long in coming, so glorious and real! " _Finished! He's dead!_ " Quinn gasped, then, as Lusiel's energy finally dissipated, her rage easing, and she was left to pant softly, gazing down at Baras' corpse as her eyes returned to their normal dark brown.

Vowrawn leapt to his feet, crying out as if in echo of Lusiel's own force-bonded shout, "He's gone! The end of Baras! Finally! It’s like fresh air suddenly fills the place!" Lusiel turned to face him, "You've proven you are truly touched by the Emperor. The Dark Council knows the Emperor's Wrath has free reign. You are answerable only to our ultimate master."

Darth Marr droned his agreement, "You are acknowledged, Wrath. Your actions will not be challenged so long as they do not contradict our own." Lusiel regarded Marr with steady and enduring strength of will, lifted her chin up, "I’ll aid the Dark Council in its most critical matters. You have only to seek my help."

Vowrawn bowed. "Then our power has heightened. Let the enemies of the Empire tremble! The Emperor's Wrath will consume them all!" Vowrawn's cry rose up over the chamber, resounding through the space with intention towards honor and accord. Each one of the Lords rose, standing tall in their place ringing the center of the room, where the Emperor's Wrath remained standing. Lusiel nodded to each one, grave and serious in her demeanor, before she finally turned and stalked back out.

Her husband stepped alongside her.


	116. Epilogue

"Don't shoot that fool!" Quinn shouted out as he pulled back his own blaster just before loosing a bolt at the dark-haired man who had managed to penetrate the interior of the estate. The fellow actually shot Quinn a grin – a toothy grin, even! Quinn only snorted disgustingly at him, in return.  Vette called out to the soldiers, rather, "Heck, they can shoot him in the leg. Or the ass! Come on, Quinn! He deserves it!"

The alarms were blaring angrily through the space, along with red lights that glared in a flashing cacophony of sensation. It made the blood seem to be pumping through their veins even harder, faster.  Khyriel pouted playfully at the twi'lek. "Ah, Vette. You're breaking my heart. I thought you'd be so happy to see me."

She glared at him, "Is that before or after you terrified me into jumping dripping wet out of the bathing stall when the alarms started blaring?"

Luckily for the agent, the soldiers responded to Quinn's direction rather than Vette's. They each backed away, raising up the muzzle of their blasters to avoid firing a bolt at the man. He waved at them, even as Quinn manipulated the controls in order to deactivate the alarms. That's when everyone could finally hear the soft laughter coming from the woman standing slightly behind Khyriel.

"Raina, please. You're embarrassing me," Khyriel glanced back at his wife with an eyebrow raised.  She laughed harder, "You wouldn't know the meaning of the word, actually. I'm just waiting for someone to shoot you in the ass."

"I thought you liked my ass," he purred towards her.

Raina smiled at Vette, "Apparently she doesn't like it too much, though. And here I thought you'd impressed her, Khy. Perhaps you should work on your technique."  Just then, Pierce rushed into the room, his chest plate loose one buckle at the top and with his rifle upraised. Vette quickly pointed at the agent, "Shoot him in the ass, Pierce!" But Quinn hissed at her.

"Stop it, Vette! You're going to get someone killed. Perhaps _you'd_ like to explain to Lord Lusiel that we've managed to kill her own brother. But I’d rather avoid such a conversation for the meanwhile!" Then he turned to glare at Pierce, "You were obviously not prepared, lieutenant. The damn twi'lek was here before you! I swear, if anything ever happens to my lord while you're busy getting your damn cock rubbed, I'll rip you apart, Pierce! I mean it!"

The soldier blanched, "Noted, captain. You're right." He mumbled then, "I hate it when he's right."

"I'm normally right, lieutenant. Get used to it!" Quinn suddenly looked at the ceiling, exasperated. "Broonmark! I may not be able to see you but I know you're trying to sneak up on the agent! Stop it, before he seriously hurts you! I will not use pain meds if I have to repair your injuries."

Khyriel chuckled as a Talz suddenly appeared just behind him. Broonmark warbled an impressed tone when the Sith's brother raised up the dagger he was hiding from the Talz as he'd snuck forward, "Now I know you're her blood."

Khyriel glanced at Quinn, then. "They're good, Quinn. But it's important to test them, too. Otherwise they get complacent. And we can't have that, can we?"

Quinn scowled bitterly, "You got to the last chamber before Lord Lusiel's private space. It's damned unacceptable."

"If it helps, I can only think of perhaps two others who might have managed such a feat. Your security measures are extraordinary, Quinn." Khyriel shook his head, "I had to stop and treat Raina for a burn along the way, in fact."

"Two others is too many," Quinn remained angry as he faced his brother-in-law. He directed the crowd to disperse, blatantly ignoring the whispers of Khyriel’s likeness and what traits he might share with their Sith Lord.  Then he gestured for Khyriel and Temple to follow him into the inner chambers where he frantically secured his wife before rushing to respond to the alarms.

Khyriel stopped suddenly when he caught sight of Lusiel. She was standing next to a table where she'd been eating her mid-day meal under Quinn's watchful gaze when the alarms started blaring. Now her hands were placed onto her hips so that she could properly glare at her brother as he ambled into the room. He only stopped to gape at her.  "She's pregnant!" Raina burst out laughing again when Khyriel blurted the words. His dark eyes warmed as he took in his sister's new, rounded shape. 

Lusiel was small enough, that her belly protruded quite adamantly at only five months along.  Quinn worried that she was too small for the rapid growth of their baby, watched every hint of development like he was a predatory bird watching for prey.  He insisted on a carefully monitored diet and daily motions that kept his wife fit for the impending birth.  And when he wasn’t considering her physical welfare, he was busily preparing security measures in and around the estate and inculcating rumors of her busy efforts undermining the ever-popular revolts on the planet of Correllia, lead by some fellow named Torvix now.  To explain why she was so long out of sight, of course.  Seeing Khyriel’s surprise, Quinn slowly relaxed as he determined her true vulnerability was still a secret.

Quinn nodded, "You were right, by the way. Pregnant women do crave ice cream quite regularly. We now have a standing order for denta bean ice cream. Which we have to smuggle in from Coruscant, unfortunately.  The supplies from Corellia are too spotty."

Khyriel frowned over at him, “Your security measures here need improving.”  Raina guffawed, “Didn’t you just get finished telling him how impressive it all was?”  Khyriel shook his head.  He only stepped closer to Lusiel as he considered how much damage could be done to her, when her simplest center of gravity was off-kilter, “I included Lusiel in that determination, however.”

But Lusiel held up a hand, grabbing her brother’s hand so she could yank him close enough he could feel the press of her child under his fingers.  Khyriel gaped down at their clasped hands, as Lusiel told him, “If you imagine I would allow anything to go wrong in this, you don’t know me so well, Khy.  I will not allow _anyone_ to harm her.”  Khyriel looked up at her, so that their brown eyes stared deeply back into each other’s, “A female, then?  Like you?”

Lusiel grinned, “She’ll be much like her father, actually.  And maybe, a little like you, too.” She leaned closer, until her forehead rested gently against his own, "Please. I should be properly angry at you for your untimely arrival and the subsequent disruption of my daily routine.  Quinn will be highly bothered if I do not finish my meal, mind you.  So please …  Stop looking so much undone.”

Khyriel stepped back then, effected a proper brotherly stance as he glared over at Quinn, “You made my sister pregnant.”

Quinn leaned back on the heels of his feet, his hands clasped behind his back. Lusiel wasn't surprised he managed to maintain his serious expression and even tone as he joked back at his brother-in-law. Gods, she loved his overly proper Imperial demeanor, she thought. "I enjoyed that part."  Quinn was actually appreciative of Khyriel’s subtle attempt to shift his state of mind away from the same fear and anxiety he felt whenever he noted his daughter’s movements under Lusiel’s belly.

Lusiel smiled an evil and dangerous smirk towards Quinn, "Are you saying you're not enjoying this part?"

Khyriel chuckled, "Lie, lie, lie!  Don’t upset the tender equilibrium of my pregnant sister!"  Lusiel and Quinn stared at each other for a long moment, as Khyriel stood there watching them. He wasn't certain but it seemed they were sharing some sort of message, even though neither one of them said a word. But, finally, Lusiel turned back to her brother and reached out to hug him, "Introduce me to your wife, Khy. It's been long enough."

Khyriel nodded, reaching out to grasp Raina's hand and pull her up against his side, “Lou, this is my wife, Raina. Love, this is the Sith Lord, Lusiel, my sister. She will guard you as fiercely as I will."  Lusiel thought the introduction was strange enough, until she reached out her senses to consider the slim young woman standing in front her. Raina Temple was a dark-skinned human with short black hair. The markings on her leathered armor were indicative of her loyalty to the Empire, except she faced Lusiel with nervousness lining her every sense. She glanced at Khyriel, "She isn’t strong enough for Korriban.  She will not go, do you understand?”

Khyriel nodded, “I know as much.  I need additional measures, assurances.  I’ll take the necessary steps, but it isn’t why I’m here."

"Of course. She can help me finish my lunch, then.”  Lusiel grinned devilishly, “Quinn keeps trying to force more food down me. It's becoming tiresome."

Quinn frowned at her, "You don't eat enough even when you're _not_ pregnant."  Lusiel only smiled at him, though, as they all sat down around the table. She nodded at Temple to begin eating, even as she picked up her own eating utensils once again. Toovee had prepared her favorite meal, fish cakes served with Tatooine podpoppers and bristlemelon. The sweet fruit eased her craving for sugary food, although Quinn settled primarily on the fish.

Lusiel glanced at her brother, then. "I thought you might have come in order to check on the progress of my pregnancy. Except you didn't know about it until after you arrived. So tell me. What's the matter, Khy?"

"You do realize it took me weeks to even figure out where you were, Lou. You might have told me the truth during your last message." Khyriel grimaced at her. But she shook her head at him, "I will not allow any risk to my child, Khy. Quinn insisted and I agreed.  You do realize he decrypted your algorithms months ago, right?" Lusiel ignored the hard glare Khyriel sent at Quinn, and shrugged, "Which doesn't answer my question, either.  You wouldn't have come all the way here only to berate me for not telling you where here was."

Khyriel leaned back in his chair. He looked at Lusiel with an overly serious expression, especially for him. The last time he'd looked at her like that … well, she couldn't remember the last time he'd looked at her like that. If he ever had. Her brother tended to maintain an air of complete nonchalance and utter hilarious charm on such a routine basis that few people knew he was even half so intelligent, articulate, and downright dangerous as he really was.  It was all so very effected, until he only ever bared his true demeanor in moments like this where he was surrounded by family.  Now he stared over at her across the table, "I've discovered _why_ mother killed father."

The statement struck Lusiel like a blow. She sat back, stunned. Quinn frowned at Khyriel, concerned that the agent had upset his wife. But he remained silent as Lusiel processed the information. Lusiel gathered herself, "I told you ages ago it didn't matter to me. She was mad, Khy. I'm _glad_ she's dead. I might have killed her myself if she hadn't flung herself out the window when she saw me."

"I would have helped you. Although now I think her death was far too easy," Khyriel's eyes went so dark they almost looked black. Lusiel frowned, so he began explaining. "It was always strange, this record I discovered once detailing a particular financial transaction that father made earlier that same night. It was a curious transfer of monies, a large sum into an account that, at first glance, seemed to be little more than charity. But the timing was always strange to me.  Except that Dace assured me it was nothing to be concerned over, just a child he felt sorry for."  Raina reached out to grab Khyriel’s hand when he mentioned Dace Gredge.  Khyriel sighed, holding her clasped fingers even though he didn’t look at her.

He only slowly rubbing the bridge of his nose. "The child was injured that same day, seriously enough the records indicated her chances of surviving intact were negligible  Then the child actually disappeared only hours before the transaction was made. It was only odd."  Lusiel still looked confused. But Quinn was starting to shake his head. He asked Khyriel, "You found the child, didn't you?"

Khyriel shrugged, "It was only slightly harder to find you, here.  She didn’t _want_ to be found out; even perfected an entire break from the Empire as a whole.  No one’s ever known she was even born on Dromund Kaas, let alone injured and survived to grow up, here."

Quinn sighed, "Thanks for that."

Khyriel didn't even smile. He only looked at Lusiel, grimly. "Her name is Kastiel. Apparently, Da took her out of the hospital and transferred her into the care of one of his oldest teammates.  In the lower reaches of Kaas City, mind you.  That’s where she grew up, scarred, and crippled.  She eventually left to take up bounty work, picked up quite a reputation.  Then a few years ago she entered some Great Hunt the Mandalorians host traditionally, and she won it.  Unsurprisingly, mind you.  She’s their Champion, and fully adopted into their clans.  Even married one of their warriors.”  Khyriel nearly laughed, then, "I met him. He's more far more fierce than Quinn, here, if you can believe it. Told me he'd 'crush my skull' if I did anything to hurt her."  Quinn inhaled slowly as he thought quickly, putting all the pieces into place in the puzzle.  Because of _course_ the Hunter was always familiar!

Lusiel didn’t understand so quickly.  But perhaps that was only because Kastiel always strived to stay out of her sister’s sight, so Lusiel outright asked her brother now, "What does any of this have to do with mother and father?"  Khyriel sighed. To him, family was everything and blood was more valuable than anything. It was a lesson their father imparted to them both, and one he'd held true no matter how old he grew or how far removed from his father's guidance. "Because it was mother that paid for the attack that nearly killed Kastiel.  That’s why Da confronted Karen that night, hated her.  Because she did it to destroy _them_.”

"Them?"

"Lusiel." Khyriel looked her straight in the eye.  He leaned forward, "Kastiel’s the eldest of Da’s children by his slave girl, Tamerie.  She’s our _sister_. She's Lucian Phyre's daughter. Only three months younger than you, in fact."

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Lusiel leaned her head down to stare at the floor as her daughter slowly rolled sideways against what she assumed was one of her kidneys.  Considering her sudden pressing need for the refresher stall, at least.  But Quinn stepped close behind her right then, moving up to clasp both her shoulders in his hands.  She turned into his arms, looking up at him gratefully.

“You’ll find them for me?  Verify their well-being, their safety … If they have need of me, you will tell me.”  Lusiel felt the frantic push to ascertain that all her blood was secure, felt off-balance so long as such precious people were out of her reach and control.  She couldn’t see them, didn’t know and it offended her so profoundly that Quinn wondered at its depth and fervor.  It almost seemed unnatural, this compulsion to protect anyone she might call brother or sister. 

She didn’t even stop to ask details of them, just insisted that Quinn go and find them _now_.

“I know where they are, Lusiel.  They seem perfectly capable of providing for their own needs, mind you.  But I will endeavor to verify it in time enough to return and welcome our daughter.”  He knelt in front of his wife, wrapped his arms around her as he gently place his ear over the mound of Lusiel’s stomach, “Only keep my own offspring safe while I’m so far away.  Please?”

Lusiel gently speared her fingers through his hair and pressed his head closer to her, “We’ll be right here, my Malavai.  Hurry.”


End file.
